Singapore was hit by another flood again and it is starting to get embarrassing for the Gahmen who has earlier dismissed it as a freak accident of nature that occur once every 50 years.
So what is the score since Nov 2009? 5?
Last weekend, we were hit with another bloody downpour (We are going to have a Waste Water Campaign real soon) and a certain Mr Shafie Goh from Lianhe Wanbao was on assignment to cover the event.
He was at Bukit Timah where the flooding occur and, by looking at the pictures, he appeared to be at Maplewoods (just further up from Tan Chong Motors) where he was detained and cuffed by a policeman.
According to Shafie, he was there minding his own business and taking photos before a policeman who was earlier sitting in the police car came out to stop him from taking photos. When he refused to comply, he was cuffed and taken away to the side before being released an hour later.
According to the police, Shafie was taken away as they felt that he was endangering himself during the process of taking pictures and/or perhaps obstructing police work and/or traffic.
It was a case of his word against the police.
I find it hard to figure out on a few points.
- There was not much traffic given that there was a heavy flood going on.
- I don't think Shafie was endangering himself in anyway. It was just a flood. Floods at Bukit Timah are nothing new and has been like that for decades, I remembered walking in almost waist deep water from Sixth Avenue to Barker Road during my student days to go to school. I, for one can attest, that there is nothing dangerous about it lest you are stupid enough to be right at the big canal running alongside between Dunearn Road and Bukit Timah Road.
- Obstructing police work? Er... I think he was nowhere near the police and that the nearest one was sitting inside the police car before he came out and cuffed him. So what? Obstructing his view har?
- Taking pictures of sensitive nature? I think the nearest sensitive sites would have been some Ministers' home and the Rifle Range on the other side of the canal, neither which is near Maplewoods where Shafie was doing his own stuff.
That said, why the gangster tactics?
The way the police handled the situation cannot be explained and I for one am keen to find out how the police is going to recover from this PR booboo.
I wait with baited breath.
Image Credit: http://news.asiaone.com
- Voxeros
No comments:
Post a Comment