There’s a very different sense of security when you are walking along the sidewalks in a typical Singapore street. You just feel much more “relax”. There’s no need to keep watching around for suspicious characters or switch into “Alert Mode” when you heard the sound of cruising motorbikes.

Very often, you see policemen patroling the streets and makes you feel that even if someone’s going to commit a crime, he is very likely not going to get away very easily. Or he can always cross over to Malaysia, where he can get away with his loot easily anytime. Yes, you can make a living by becoming a part time robber, it’s so lucrative that even the law enforcers themselves cannot resist such temptations.

The Malaysian Bar Council…

This is the shocking resume of a 25-year-old police constable who has served the force for two years.

His double life was finally exposed when he was arrested on Jalan Silang on Friday night.

It was greeted with disbelief among those who knew him as he is said to be a quiet man and dedicated worker.

The return on investment for every attempt is so high and the risk of actually getting caught is so low that the whole idea makes perfect sense to someone who have a little spare time after work.

Again, we can use the same reasoning that Malaysia is a larger country in terms of size and population. However, I still believe very much that the difference is not because of such quantitative measures, but rather a qualitative one. For example, if there’s one leaking pipe in a plumbing system, there’s no way you can even build an effective small plumbing system. So if one tries to build a bigger plumbing system with the leaking pipe still not replaced, it’s only going to exagerrate the problem. So, unless the policymaker is serious about fixing the leaking pipe (which is a qualitative issue), there’s no way we can see the results no matter what kind of structure plans we have for the plumbing system.

Putting a badge saying “anti-graft” on law enforcers only makes it very silly, since they should not be associated with graft at all in the first place. Increasing the wage level of law enforcers will not change anything as long as they do put the public’s safety as their number one priority. You can use any reward schemes to motivate them, but as long as their values (qualitative aspect) do not change, crime will continue to flourish because these criminals understand that no one is bothered enough.

It’s already a very silly thing to be hiring security guards in housing area (a very obvious evidence that we can no longer rely on the police force to take care of our safety). We hope that there’s no need to hire personal bodyguards to ensure we can get from one place to another without being held at knife/gun point.

So, why are we not seeing any improvements on the qualitative side of our public security system?

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