RDU West

Wishing all parents a Happy Parents Day!

The RDU West team was visiting residents at Blk 109 Jurong East Street 13 on Friday. Emily Woo shares more.

RDU West wishes all Buddhist residents Happy Vesak Day!

RDU West wishes all Muslim residents Selamat Hari Raya Haji!

A life needlessly lost?

𝗪𝗲 𝗠𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝗛𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗟𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗮 𝗟𝗶𝗳𝗲 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝘂𝗸𝗶𝘁 𝗣𝗮𝗻𝗷𝗮𝗻𝗴 𝗟𝗥𝗧 𝗶𝗳 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗛𝗮𝗱 𝗧𝗮𝗸𝗲𝗻 𝗣𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗰 𝗪𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝗦𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗼𝘂𝘀𝗹𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗘𝗱𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗖𝗵𝗶𝗮 𝗛𝗮𝗱 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗛𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗥𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀

My RDU West team and I visited the Segar LRT Station where Mr Loh Hee Chen died a day ago. What went wrong? We needed to find out. We also paid our respects to his family at the wake the day after. But after doing all that I was at a loss as to how to talk about this incident properly. I was upset. I was angry. Because this was a totally avoidable tragedy. It was a tragedy in the making for more than 15 years. The signs were all there.

From 2010 onwards, LTA’s own figures show an average of about three LRT track intrusions every year – roughly 50 in total – even after barriers and other “safeguards” were put in. In 2015, the decision was made to roll out glass and steel barriers at all LRT stations but to leave actual platform doors out, so the gaps to the tracks remained. Later, they said AI‑powered video analytics would be deployed to “capture events” and prevent accidents. Let me say that again: AI to prevent accidents.

The public were surprised. Many were shocked. Some wrote in to the press to say that AI cannot stop someone from falling onto the tracks. One even predicted – three years ago – that someone might become unconscious and fall onto the tracks and AI would do nothing, absolutely nothing, to prevent it.

People also questioned LTA’s line that there is “insufficient space” on LRT platforms for screen doors and that signal controls, cables and power needs make doors too cumbersome. They pointed to existing technology in Japan, even at platform areas with severe space constraints, where walls and columns are as little as 1.5m from the train doors and yet platform screen doors are still installed.

All these pleas seemed to fall on deaf ears. And I cannot shake-off the suspicion that the unspoken reason, the real reason no one wants to say out loud, is cost. LRTs were sold from day one as a “cost‑effective” transport solution. Maybe proper platform doors were simply deemed too expensive. If so, what is the price tag that has been put on a human life?

Any system that consistently puts dollars and cents above the lives of human beings is an evil power.

Then I chanced upon Edward Chia Bing Hui 谢秉辉’s post about the incident, and I got even more frustrated. Why? Because it reads like performance.

In all the years he has been MP for Holland‑Bukit Timah GRC, how often has he spoken up about LRT safety? I checked. Once. And even then, he asked the Transport Minister about the “learning points” from a malfunctioning network switch – after the incident had already happened. “Learning points”, after the fact.

Today he says he is arranging emergency funds for the family. That is good. I have spoken to them. They have lost their main breadwinner. They are distraught. Some funds to tide over will help.

But what they really want are answers. They know the power asymmetry between themselves, SMRT, LTA and those in government. They know their voice is smaller. They wonder if justice will ever be done. Will it?

Will an MP who has never seriously fought for safety on the LRT – the main public transport lifeline for residents in the area – now suddenly follow up diligently with the authorities so that the family gets justice? Will he fight for his residents and insist on that blasted barrier, on real doors and real protection, instead of another round of polite “learning points”?

I hope he does. If he truly fights for them, I will eat my words about his response being performative.

In the meantime, I have written to the Acting Transport Minister Jeffrey Siow （萧振祥） for answers, and copied LTA and SMRT. My team and I will stand with Mr Loh’s family. We will push for answers. We will do what we can to get those platform doors up, and to change the conditions that made this tragedy possible.

Because a force for good will never treat human beings as collateral in a cost‑saving exercise. And for me, I want to make sure no one else has to die this way.

On 18 May 2026, a 68 year old man, Mr Loh Hee Chen, fell onto the tracks at Segar LRT station and was believed to have been run over by an oncoming train. The following evening, the RDU West team went down to Segar LRT to better understand the conditions on the ground and to listen to residents, commuters, and workers involved in the ongoing lift upgrading works. The team later visited the wake of Mr Loh to express condolences to his family and loved ones.

What was observed raises difficult questions about the conditions many elderly commuters are expected to navigate today. At Segar LRT, there are no proper platform screen doors, only fixed barriers with open gaps facing the tracks. The priority boarding area has been partially blocked off by barricades for lift upgrading works, narrowing parts of the walkway leading to the platform. Residents also described the station as stuffy and warm even with fans running, particularly in the early mornings when commuters may already be tired or unwell.

Several residents shared concerns about the steep stair access during periods when lifts are unavailable. One elderly commuter who regularly uses the Bukit Panjang LRT shared that even though he still considers himself healthy and mobile, the climb has become tiring during the upgrading period. Others pointed out that the signage for alternative arrangements is too wordy and difficult for some seniors to follow quickly.

This also does not appear to be an isolated issue. Since 2010, there have been roughly 50 LRT track intrusions despite existing barriers and safety measures. Yet commuters are still being told that proper platform screen doors face “technical limitations”, even as AI surveillance systems are deployed across the Bukit Panjang LRT line to monitor commuters standing too close to the edge.

The RDU West team will be writing to the authorities with recommendations to improve commuter safety, especially for seniors, PMA users, and families who rely on the LRT system daily. Public transport safety should not become a question of whether a system is merely functional enough. It should begin from the principle that every commuter deserves to return home safely.

RDU West gets mentioned by Straits Times today!

Those of us who've played older video games know what God mode really means.

It's the cheat code that makes you invincible. No damage. Infinite resources. Unstoppable. You walk through enemies like they're not even there—because in God mode, they aren't. They're NPCs: non-player characters following a script, incapable of changing the outcome. The game isn't a challenge anymore. It's a formality.

That's the People's Action Party in Singapore. God mode enabled for 60 years. And the rest of us? We're cast as the NPCs.

Look at what one side controls. The narrative. The laws. The economy. The bureaucracy. The media. Electoral rules. Public fear. Access to opportunity. Even what counts as "realistic."

They decide when elections happen. They redraw boundaries to erase threats. Competition isn't a fight—it's a formality they permit.

In such a scenario, all other political parties become NPCs. Even the ones with seats. Especially the ones with seats—because now they can bleed you through the courts for town council failures, prosecute your leader when one MP misspeaks, flip your own former colleagues to testify you're criminals. The seats aren't victories. They're hostages. Play your scripted role as "responsible opposition" or watch everything burn. That's not democracy. That's a leash with parliamentary privileges.

It is in this context that you must read today's ST article which talks about Red Dot United, Singapore Democratic Party and Progress Singapore Party. No other political parties were mentioned, presumably because they do not have the people's mindshare. On the surface it reads like "these are the most relevant parties outside the two that are in Parliament"—but look closer at the framing. We are caricatured as needing to "deconflict" with each other over territory, as if we are each other's opponents.

For any serious reader who reads between the lines, the subtext is clear: opposition parties fragment, compete, and "jostle for attention" while the PAP governs. We're measured not by whether our policies are credible or our ground game is strong, but by survival metrics—volunteer counts, geographic reach, whether we're still relevant a year after losing. The article doesn't ask if RDU's 50% volunteer growth signals momentum, or if our initiative, Altgovsg's shadow ministries represent genuine policy capacity.

Instead it asks if we're fading. Because in God mode, that's what opposition parties are supposed to do between elections: fade, fragment, and eventually disappear.

I know that gods cannot be defeated by mere mortals. This is why we have stopped playing defense since GE 2025. We have shifted to a bigger office space. Decentralised our ground work and are covering more constituencies than we contested in the last GE. We want to expand to the central and east too. If the GE is called tomorrow, we are ready to field more candidates than we fielded in the last GE. We are mirroring Government Ministries with our AltGovSG work. We are trying to work across party lines with PSP and SDP.

Of course some will ridicule what we are doing and say we are pretending, or that we are doing cosplay. Let them say what they may.

But the truth is we are rising. Rising to God mode—not by asking permission, but by becoming unstoppable. Matching their relentlessness. Rejecting their boundaries. Building infrastructure they can't ignore.

That's how mortals become gods. And their cheat code? It's breaking.

The fact is, monopolies fall to competitors who move faster and refuse to stop. The PAP runs on legacy infrastructure—60-year-old code, bloated, unrefactored, paying themselves the highest salaries in the world to maintain a system built in 1965.

RDU runs on hunger.

They have resources. We have velocity. They're on autopilot, collecting million-dollar paychecks. We're shipping daily with volunteers who pay their own transport.

God mode vs. God mode. Except theirs is running on a 60-year-old build maintained by the world's most expensive devs. Ours is bleeding edge, built by people who believe.

They have everything to protect. We have nothing to lose—and that makes us unstoppable.

RDU West wishes all moms a Happy Mother's Day!

Harish Mohanadas reflects upon the real lived experiences of seniors in Singapore living with severe health conditions and in poverty, and what Red Dot United has proposed to remedy the situation.

Yesterday, Emily Woo, myself and our RDU West team visited a block of rental flats in Senja Road, in Holland–Bukit Timah GRC. Many of the residents are older Singaporeans, living in small units, with health problems and very little income.

Many shared with us their hopes, struggles and aspirations, but one story stayed with me. The story of a 68-year-old Chinese man – a taxi driver who is bankrupt. He went for spine surgery about a year ago, but could not stay home long enough to recover properly. He is still in a lot of pain because he has to sit for long hours to do his job, even if it is only part-time. He has to wear a bandage on his lower back, but it does not help much to ease the pain. He has to work to pay rent for the taxi, and also because he has to pay rent to HDB, which had increased from $59 to $99 recently. He was worried that if he earned even a little more, HDB would ask him to pay $165.

I did not understand this. Really I don't.

What kind of a system expects a 68-year-old man to work till he drops?

His story reminded me of another story I read in the papers, which happened a few blocks away near Blk 647B Senja Close, just about a week ago. A 69‑year‑old amputee died after a garbage truck hit him while he was collecting recyclables near the rubbish point at the block. He had lost his right leg and moved around in a wheelchair. People in the area said he was often seen there collecting cans and bottles from the bins.

When I read that news, I remember thinking: was it the garbage truck that killed him, or was it poverty? Poverty that meant he had to work, and work collecting rubbish, at the age of almost 70. Don’t tell me he was collecting recyclables “just to exercise”.

What kind of a system drives the old, the sick and the most vulnerable to this extent?

These are not people who coasted. They are the generation that worked when wages were low, CPF was thin, and there was no Workfare or Progressive Wage to top up their incomes. They built today’s Singapore, but they are now growing old in a high‑cost city on a low‑support floor. Food, utilities, medical bills and basic necessities are priced like a rich country. Their protection is still designed like we are a poorer one.

If my party and I had our way, support for the 68-year-old part-time taxi driver we met – the senior citizen who is suffering from a spine injury – would stop being a razor-thin token.

This is why, in Red Dot United’s Shadow Budget 2026, we proposed at least $500 every month for the poorest 30% of seniors, and $700 for those who make it past 80 in small flats with almost no CPF left. We have to admit that the system has underpaid them all their lives. That way, they could work if they wanted to – really to exercise, or to pass time – but not because the system requires them to break their bodies as a sacrifice to keep the wheels churning.

I will talk about the other people we spoke to yesterday at another time. But this story consumes me at the moment. I don’t believe it is right that we treat our seniors this way.

What do you think?

Emily Woo highlights further cutting down of mature Khaya and Sea Apple trees near Blk 305 Jurong East St 32 by Jurong-Bukit Batok-Clementi Town Council.

For a previous report, see:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CwAtCyvQ4/