Do you believe in God?

I am asking this question because I think I should share my experience with the public.

I was educated at the Methodist Boys' School in Kuala Lumpur. It was an American Mission school and bible study was part of the school curriculum. But I was not baptised and I was a free thinker all my life until lately.

I had never believed that God would perform miracles. In 1961 I was an Inspector in the Special Branch and was the main dramatis personae in an American Central Intelligency Agency (CIA) adventure to recruit me as an agent to provide them with sensitive security intelligence. I had the prime minister's authority to go along with them. They regarded me as such an important recruit that they decided first to put me through a series of stringent tests to prove my authenticity.

The final test was to put me through a lie-detector test. They regarded my recruitment as so important that they brought two veteran polygraph experts from their war theatre in Saigon to conduct the test. I was completely unprepared for it and it caught me with my pants down. I was warned that the two polygraphers were vulnerable and that their personal security could not be compromised in any way and at any cost.

I was placed in the most vulnerable situation. If I were to go through the polygraph test I would be exposing myself  as having betrayed them. One of the questions that the polygraphers would put to me was whether I had reported my CIA recruitment to the Special Branch. Whatever it was I think the polygraphers were experienced and shrewed enough and that there was not an earthly chance that I could pass the polygraph test. I was desparately trying to find a convincing excuse to defer the polygraph test because  it would mean that they would do anything not excluding assassination to protect their security. The only reason I could think of to convince them to defer the test was that I had never experienced such procedure and that I feared  that my health would be adversely affected. It was so puerile that it could not even convince a common man and how could it convince the experts? They wanted to discuss this among themselves and left me alone to sweat out.

After what seemed to be an eternity they surprisingly told me that I could go and  they will conduct the polygraph test another time. I could hardly believe my ears but I recovered quickly to make a prompt exit from the safe house where the meeting was held. As soon as I emerged from the house, Special Branch arrest teams which had been earlier deployed around the house immediately moved in  to make the arrests.There was some Hollywood style pursuit when the two polygraphers managed to escape in a car but they were eventually captured.

This had been the part that had been excercising my mind and that of my colleagues and friends on what had actually transpired that so miraculously lifted me out of danger. The CIA officers were discussing what to do with me and it could only be the benevolence of God that influenced them to release me. It's just not believable or possible for a group of security experts to  have been convinced with my puerile excuse to defer the polygraph test.

As a gratitude to God for his protection of me at a time of grave personal danger I became baptised at the Cornerstone Community Church on 2 February this year. It has been a long time since the CIA adventure but I accomplished me wish to serve God before I depart from this world.

The Universal Devastation of the Coronavirus

The World Health Organisation has declared that the Coronavirus is a pandemic with the implications that the world is going to face the horrifying threat of existential devastation.

Singapore seems to be handling the crisis well, a credit to the self-centred PM Lee Hsien Loong and his cohort of mercenary minsters. They are probably trying to justify their obscene salaries drawn from the taxpayers money apart from trying to show that they are altuistic. Other countries like China, where the virus originated, South Korea  and Italy are so badly affected that they are at their wits' end trying to find a solution. china, however, is showing some sign of improving the situation.

Some devout christians may atttribute this crisis, based on the bible, to a pestilence imposed by God as a punishment of the sinners. But Chinese President Xi Jin Ping can hardly be regarded as an unpardonable sinner. There are other similar, if not more, notorious sinners like the US President Donald Trump, the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and certain other notorious Middle East butchers. Could they also be the targets of the wrath of God. It may not sound so plausible and scientists are stlll baffled trying to find the origin of this behemoth and may not find the answer.

Meanwhile experts have predicted that the coronavirus will last till the end of the year. This is not sanguine and the world may face the gloomy prospect of facing a prolonged period of existential devastation resulting in the deterioration of the peoples' livelihood.What will happen if it does not end at the end of the year?  Even after the crisis is over it will still take a long time for rehabilitation.
What is it that brings such a gigantic disaster to the world may never be found.

A Holistic Perception of Lim Chin Siong

Lim Chin Siong was a prominent figure at the height of the Communist United Front (CUF) campaign in the fifties and sixties in the last century.

Lim Chin Siong was born in Singapore but grew up in Pontian, Johore and was educated at the Chinese High School in Singapore. The Chinese HIgh School was a hotbed of communist activities and Lim Chin Siong was actively involved as a Anti-British League (ABL) cell leader. He was not an outstanding student. Special Branch officers visited the school in 1951 to arrest him but by some mysterious turn of event he evaded arrest. He was also not found at his home. So for all intents and purposes he had gone underground and was not traceable.

He was believed to have gone underground for training by the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) to prepare him to lead the CUF but he claimed after  his arrest in Operation Coldstore in 1963 that he was working at one of the branches of the Singapore Bus Workers'Union but later events were to discredit this. Special Branch had the SBWU and its branches well covered and there was no report of him although he was a wanted person.

When in 1953/1954 the Communist United Front blazed forth in Singapore like a titan overnight and Lim Chin Siong emerged as the undisputed leader of the CUF out of nowhere.  It was the start of a long journey by the Communists through the CUF to seize power and establish a Communist government. It begs the question that any sensible person especially a discerning one could believe that Lim Chin Siong could become the CUF leader without the imprimatur of the Communist Party of Malaya. The CUF was formed as a result of the direction of a 1951 October Resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the CPM to complement the armed struggle to overthrow the government and establish a Communist state, the declared aim of the CPM. Any denial by the CUF that they were directed by the CPM flew in the face of the October Resolution. Special Branch had sight of the October Resolution long before but the gigantic phenomenon was something there they did not expect and greatly alarmed them. They were resilent enough to recover quickly to fight the communist monster with experienced personnel with the necessary experties.

Tere was no question about the leadership quality of Lim Chin Siong as otherwise highly intellectual pro-communists like Devan Nair, James Puthucheary, Sydney Woodhull and unionist Fong Swee Suan would not have condescended to serve under Lim. The fact that their legal adviser Lee Kuan Yew ingratiated himself into Lim's favour was a example of Lim Chin Siong's pre-eminence. The two had subsequently become undeclared adversaries and the subtleties of their internecine interplay could not be observed by veteran Special Branch officers and some members of their inner circle.

Lim Chin Siong was Chinese educated and had a political advantage over Lee Kuan Yew among the Chinese masses. And Lim Chin Siong's mastery of the Hokkien dialect was something that endeared him to the Chinese masses which Lee Kuan Yew cannot match and could only gape in amazement. Lee Kuan Yew had even introduced Lim Chin Siong to his guests as the future prime minister of Singapore which may not be authentic but neverthless it showed the condition of his mind which was perpetually in a sublimnal preoccupied existential threat. If not for Special Branch Lim Chin Siong could easily have become prime minister of Singapore and Lee Kuan Yew his prisoner. Lim Chin Siong may not be as competent as Lee Kuan Yew in affairs of state but he could be more humanitarian.

Special Branch, with the approval of Chief Minister Lim Yew Hock, decided that Lim Chin Siong and his fellow activitists be put away at the appropriate time to make way for a democratic government. Lee Kuan Yew was a titan in bringing prosperity to Singapore and in raising the status of Singapore to a first world country. But at the same time he could not escape the odium of being inhuman in the treatment of his political opponents like Lim Chin Siong, Dr. Lim Hock Siew and Chia Thye Poh.

Lim Chin Siong's end was pathetic. After his return from exile in the UK he was at a loose end and I think his affluent younger brother helped him in the livelihood of him and his family. He died in 1996 from myscardial infarction. In a more revolutionised circumstances his name could be immortalised in history.

Link to My Old Blog

http://singaporerecalcitrant.blogspot.com/