Leong Mun Wai was told off by Ng Eng Hen in Parliament on Monday (May 9) for questions that were irrelevant and went completely against what the latter raised.
Non-Constituency Member of Parliament Leong Mun Wai (PSP) was responding after Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said that the “societal cost” of enlisting women into National Service (NS) now will “far outweigh” the benefits. Dr Ng’s reasoning was that enlisting women into NS would delay their entry into the workforce, and this would have the immediate effect of accentuating a decline in the local manpower pool and a reduction in household incomes.
Dr Ng felt that Mr Leong’s response was “completely against what I’ve said in the last 15 minutes”, and added that Mr Leong’s questions were “not germane”.
Mr Leong then said that he generally agreed with Mr Ng, but added, “Is the sharing of the burden of the defence of our country now being reviewed in view of the fact that we have a rising population, but we continue to have a declining number of male enlistees. So is there a review being done as to how we can ensure that the sharing of the burden of the defence of this country is being done properly?”
When asked to clarify, Mr Leong said: “What I’m referring to is the burden of defending this country must be shared, in my opinion, by all the citizens of this country. That’s why we are today talking about what the role women (sic) can play”. He also asked why the situation of insufficient male enlistees in the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) was allowed to continue.
To this, Dr Ng replied that he had “gone to great lengths in describing that the SAF, even from its inception, had made use of technology and optimising its resources”.
He added that the assertion by Mr Leong goes “completely against what I’ve said in the last 15 minutes, and he either does not believe me and thinks that the SAF is not credible and therefore the rest of his questions are not germane”.
In his speech, while Dr Ng acknowledged that birth rates have fallen, he said the use of technology and optimisation of resources has produced a modern SAF that is more lethal and effective despite a smaller number of soldiers. /TISG