On Saturday Shanmugam spoke at the My Nee Soon carnival and exhibition. With the support of state media whose sole raison d’êtreHe was clearly in electioneering mode and keen to paint a glowing picture of prospective developments in his constituency

He waxed lyrical about the new Chong Pang integrated centre, set to be completed in 2027, which will house the Chong Pang Community Club, Chong Pang Hawker Centre and Market, swimming pools and a supermarket, among other amenities. Hoping to appeal to voters he said, “Of course, it will make the whole place look better, and I expect that values of the flats will also go up nearby, not just Chong Pang but also Nee Soon Central,”

However his remarks struck me as tone deaf. After all Shanmugam has recently sold his GCB at Astrid Hill for a staggering $88 million, having bought it for $8 million only 20 years ago. I calculated this to be an over 13% p.a. compounded annualised return, far greater than the S&P500’s return of 10% p.a. over the same period. It’s also much greater than the published returns on our Sovereign Wealth Funds over the same period. The PAP’s deliberate policy of making it easy for High Net Worth Individuals (HNWI), especially billionaires, to acquire Singapore PR and citizenship enabling them to buy landed properties must have a large role in pushing up prices. Ditto the failure to effectively crack down on money laundering and a failure to instill a compliance culture as demonstrated by the recent cases involving over $3 billion of assets. MHA, the Ministry Shanmugam heads, is responsible for approving new citizenship and PR applications. Shanmugam refuses to disclose the identity of his buyer, which is hidden behind a trust, though if it is a new citizen I am not suggesting that he played any role in the approval process. Instead of providing greater transparency, Shanmugam (and Tan See Leng) have sued Bloomberg and The Online Citizen for suggesting that they have been secretive and non-transparent (see article in the Asia Sentinel here).

The staggering gains made by Shanmugam are no doubt duplicated and surpassed by many of the other PAP Ministers including ex-PM LHL and his wife who will have inherited a large property portfolio from his parents. But they are not open to the vast majority of ordinary Singaporeans who, as a result of deliberate policy by the PAP Government which controls 80% or more of Singapore’s land, are only able to buy HDBs with 99 year leaseholds. While the value of those that still have more than 50 years to run will rise when there are improvements or new transport links in their area, these rises will be much lower than those of freehold properties.. While Shan’s and other GCBs have gone up in value by 11 times or more from 2008 to 2024, the HDB Resale Price Index has only slightly more than doubled. Price rises for individual flats with aging leases will be much less. By the time most Singaporeans pass their HDBs on to their children the value will be declining on an inexorable path towards zero as the lease gets closer to expiry while freehold properties will continue to climb.

While Shanmugam enjoys spectacular gains on the sale of his freehold property, SLA, an agency that comes under MHA of which Shanmugam is head, ,has declined to tell Singaporeans the status of the Minister’s lease of 26 Ridout Road, which should have been renewed in 2024 for a final 2 years according to the information we were given in 2023. We don’t know whether the rent was increased, which one would expect in light of the buoyant housing market, or whether it stayed at $26,500 per month. Also no explanation has been forthcoming for the ongoing construction work which can be seen in satellite photos from Google Maps and Apple Maps. It would seem odd for either Shanmugam or SLA to be spending a lot of money on large scale works so close to lease expiry so this might serve as an indication that Shanmugam’s lease may be extended.

Singaporeans who are struggling to make ends meet and working longer hours to pay for their 99 year leasehold flats only to see the value wiped out so that their descendants have to start all over again should consider whether the syatem is rigged against them and in favour of their PAP Ministers and members of the superwealthy global elite that the PAP so assiduously courts. Singaporeans are continually lectured on the necessity to keep HDB leasehold with no possibility of extension so that future generations of Singaporeans can enjoy affordable housing. With our TFR now below 1 (no thanks to PAP’s social darwinist and eugenicist policies) an increasing majority of those future generations will be foreign born. They are denied the opportunity to build generational wealth which is available to their leaders supposedly because state reserve accumulation is more important. Hopefully at the coming election Singaporeans will see through the cant and hypocrisy of Shanmugam and other members of the ruling party.

Published by kjeyaretnam

I'm a Singaporean economist who became an opposition activist. I blog to provide an alternative to the porkies that the Pinkies tell. It just so happens that my alternative is the truth. That's why I've never been sued in any civil or criminal court no matter how hard hitting my criticism. I'm quoted and interviewed and asked to speak across the world but largely censored in Singapore in an effort to silence my political opinions. The left hate me because they think I split their vote and because I eschew their outmoded economic models. Models that don't work. The Right and the Conservatives hate me because I'm a liberal. I'm not sure what the middle think of me. I don't think there are more than a handful of people in the middle, here in Singapore. I'm a Singaporean born and bred, dual heritage, my parents Singaporean established here before the State of Singapore was created. I'm not Eurasian. I read economics at Cambridge and could be broadly described as from the Keynesian school but I believe in interventions. I was formerly a successful hedge fund manager. After economics and politics my greatest interests are history, film and Makan. I run but I run so I can eat like a Singaporean. View all posts by kjeyaretnam