While Singaporeans are engaging in debate more than ever, they continue to maintain respect for the rules and regulations

WHEN Ho Peng Kee goes shopping he wears shorts. The home affairs minister is extremely careful of his image and his role as an example, "even in personal conduct". The smartly dressed politician says he has to show "you are somebody one can trust", by not allowing the slightest blemish on the respect people want to give him.

By comparison, the leader of one of the city-state's main conduits of public criticism has no such fears. James Gomez turns up at a smart Italian restaurant wearing a rugby shirt. He describes himself as a political entrepreneur - a fitting description in a country that wants everyone to be some sort of entrepreneur.

Mr Gomez sees his role as encouraging debate. "The society is changing, the people are changing. The problem is the laws are not changing," he says. "The tone is secrecy. There is no culture of disclosure, no clear statement of transparency."

Some governments might dismiss his organisation, the Think Centre, as a bunch of young people playing around with ideas. But Singapore has taken them more seriously.

Mr Gomez has run into trouble with the authorities over Speaker's Corner, the government's most high-profile concession to its critics and, for Singapore, a radical move. Initially, the government opposed the idea of the forum in Hong Lim Park, loosely based on the more-famed venue in London's Hyde Park.

"We have a multi-racial society, so allowing a place where anyone can say anything might not be a good idea," says Mr Ho.

But it went ahead, with some controls. Speakers must be Singaporeans, must register with the police before speaking and must avoid religious issues and anything that might spark racial unrest. And it is not exempt from other laws such as the ban on five or more people formally assembling without a licence.

"People feel that if they want to stand up and speak their mind, to criticise the government, they can," says Mr Ho. "It has provided a venue and it shows the government has listened." Since its launch in September, about 800 people have registered to speak. "We do not monitor the speakers. What we know is what we read in the media." He points out that it is not intended to be a mechanism for feedback. "We have a feedback unit which scours the ground. This is taken seriously."

Mr Gomez, who is himself on two feedback committees, is not convinced. He says: "Speaker's Corner is not a substitute for genuine freedoms." The activist is being investigated by the police for an event he organised last December to mark International Human Rights Day, in which speeches called for the abolition of the Internal Security Act.

The probe centres on whether it was a political assembly or a well-supported series of speeches. The police had already refused permission for the Open Singapore Centre, set up by opposition politicians to seek greater transparency, and for Mr Gomez's group to organise a marathon ending at Hong Lim Park to mark the day.

As an answer to what it sees as the shortcomings of Hong Lim Park, the Think Centre runs a website which it describes as an electronic speakers' corner, providing a forum for debate. Ironically, the organisation does have to censor its contributors in order to keep vulgarity off the site. Other websites are less restrained in their criticism of the authorities. But Mr Ho says internet criticism "is something all governments grapple with. What's important is that we must be a government that is above board. If they are issues worth airing, they will appear elsewhere."

Mr Gomez says that Singaporeans have had their ability to think stifled. "The government has created a climate of fear which has created apprehension about anything vaguely political."

The government has said that it wants to build up its citizens' ability to think and act for themselves - through a move away from rote- learning, through encouragement for innovation, even through a change in the law making it easy for entrepreneurs who fail to start again.

However, as Mr Ho's sartorial sensibilities suggest, all this must be done in a way that maintains respect for the rules.