'PAP has delivered promise'

THE People's Action Party has delivered its promise in the last General Election to upgrade the Chong Boon area in Cheng San GRC, Trade and Industry and Second Finance Minister Lee Yock Suan said yesterday. Several upgrading projects were carried out since the polls in January and there would be more in the next five years, he told reporters after visiting a market next to Block 453 on Ang Mo Kio Avenue 10.

"We have delivered our promise," he said. "We are also upgrading the neighbourhood centre at Block 527 -- that will cost $2.4 million. I think the residents are generally happy."

Mr Lee also visited shopkeepers and residents in other parts of his Chong Boon area during his walkabout yesterday. He is in charge of the parts of Chong Boon which were not hived off to the nearby Ang Mo Kio GRC at the last election.

After his victory at the polls, the activities of the Residents' and Citizens' Consultative Committees were centralised under one body.

There was no difficulty in phasing in the new operating style. Residents, he said, responded warmly because their grassroots leaders had built up a long relationship with them.

"If they have difficulties, they know where to find me at my branch every Thursday."

Referring to the "heartware" to reach out to the more than 40 per cent of the Cheng San voters who backed the Workers' Party team at the recent polls, he said he worked closely with the grassroots leaders who were very active on the ground.

"We co-ordinate our activities," he noted, adding that work was in progress for Cheng San and Ang Mo Kio GRCs to be combined under one Community Development Council (CDC). "We have already appointed the members and it will be chaired by my fellow Cheng San GRC MP, Mr Heng Chiang Meng."

He said the nearby single ward of Hougang, which is under Workers' Party MP Low Thia Khiang, would not be part of the new CDC.

Commenting on Mr Low's "spillover effect" on the Punggol parts of Cheng San, he noted that his fellow PAP MPs in the GRC have also been busy working the ground.

Newcomers Mr Zainul Abidin Rasheed and Mr Yeo Guat Kwang, he said, have been working hard to strengthen their grassroots network and there were now three PAP MPs looking after the Hougang area.

"It makes it much easier for them to cover the Hougang area thoroughly," he said. "They are going on their block visits, setting up RCs, branches, and so on. I think they are all making good progress."

Asked if the Workers' Party chief and Non-Constituency MP, Mr J. B. Jeyaretnam, who has been holding free legal clinics in Cheng San GRC, was making an impact on residents, Mr Lee replied: "Hardly anyone goes to them."