Thursday, February 28, 2008

JI Detainee Escapes: State Not Intrusive Enough?


The headline read “JI detainee Mas Selamat Kastari escapes from Singapore detention centre” and my jaw dropped to the floor.

When I wrote about the recent arrests of 2 individuals for habouring plans to conduct acts of terrorism, I discussed the difference between being protective and intrusive. The argument was of course that the Singapore government had to adopt a stance dictated by the ideals of the former. Unfortunately, given the shocking circumstances which has resulted in a massive manhunt for a dangerous former terror cell leader, I wonder if our protectors are doing a decent enough job of being intrusive.

Surely every intrusive means of surveillance and monitoring should have been dedicated to keeping real threats to society safely behind lock and key. I am sure no civil libertarian could argue against that.

Minister Wong sure has some explaining to do. First of which is how a limping middle-aged man could escape from an ISD run facility?

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mr Wong will tell everything but nothing at the same time.

barrie said...

As the saying goes, it is all in the script. I believe it is more wayang than anything else.

Anonymous said...

Very simple. He will say it was a 'freak incident' or as usual an 'honest mistake'. They have template gems to suit every situation.

Anonymous said...

As usual, attention has been succesfully diverted from the budget debate and how the great minds screwed the poor with a 2% increase in GST.
So much news about the limping terrorist that hardly anyone paid attention to the HK budget announcement yesterday. Its a people bugdet. We need leaders like those in HK. They don't get paid millions and yet a doing a ten time better job than our elites . KH is the ultimate example that true democracy works no matter what the old man says

Anonymous said...

"how a limping middle-aged man could escape from an ISD run facility"
hmmm, doesn't this sound like an old television series?
More likely, it's a staged show to distract from the budget boo boo.

Anonymous said...

Maybe its a master plan to track down the other JI members. The papers today report that there are still hundreds of JI in indon and philippines.

You know, let rat out of the cage and it leads you to its nest.

Anonymous said...

What, that must be the greatest joke of the year!

They had taken all the trouble to send a whole army police officers to deal with 4~5 harmless opposition members in front of CPF building but yet can't even take care of the security for one limping terrorist at the detention centre.

So, what is moral of the story ? You draw the conclusions.

Anonymous said...

CSJ and JBJ can't even fart without in peace as ther are 100 men waiting to charge them for illegal emmission or something and yet such honest mistakes happens..I wish I was paid to make such honest mistakes..

Anonymous said...

spread the word dear netizen. mas selamat was tortured and killed under detention. the ministry needed an excuse. that is all. think about it.

FeedMeToTheFish said...

Do we have a limping terrorist or a Lame Ministry of Home Affairs?

The greatest show, I mean WAYANG is playing right now.

Enjoy!

Anonymous said...

Use a bit of lateral thinking please!

The real issue is why the ISA was used against people like Francis Seow
and JBJ. Those actions caused more long term damage than this guy.

Anonymous said...

we all live in what is dubbed the post 9-11 era. So you think a plane hitting changi airport would not cause long term damage to singapore?

and pray tell what long term suffering do i have because francis seow was detained and now lives happily god knows where?