This academic year (1997-98) I fell out with a friend, who is both a church mate and a fellow hall resident.
 
When my friend first entered Eusoff Hall, I hoped that we would get along well because of our similar backgrounds (ie. same church).  We in fact ended up working together in the same committee, but he failed to do a good job because of his heavy commitments in church.  Soon the hall residents began to notice that he was absent from meetings and other important hall functions that he was responsible for.
 
I was disappointed.  It did not escape anyone’s notice that my friend held himself out to be a fervent Christian.  He had been elected into a position of responsibility by the hall residents because they believed that he would do a good job for them, but he turned his back on them instead to focus on his activities in church.  I was disappointed that suddenly to many non-Christians being a fervent and active Christian seemed more wrong and bad than right and good.
 
I pointed this out to him – that we aren’t doing God any favours when we excel at what we do in church, but not outside of it, that how you carry and conduct yourself outside of church, unfortunately, is what the majority of non-Christians pay attention to.  (He wasn’t convinced).
 
I was upset.  Because there was this expectation that as his friend from church, I would be able to get him to take his responsibilities in the hall more seriously.  (I couldn’t).
 
What made me even more upset was that while the world outside took a dim view of his irresponsibility, his (other, not me !) church mates looked upon – perhaps even glorified – him as a saint. 
 
I tried to point out (tactfully of course) that there should not be any disparity between the lives that Christians lead in church and outside of it – both aspects must be above reproach in the eyes of both fellow believers and non-believers.  (In vain.)

Sadly, another failed experiment at "mixing" politics and religion.
 

I’m seldom passionate about anything.  But the NUS administration’s effort to introduce the Revised Hall Admissions Points System (RHAPS) this academic year (1997-98) stirred an unusual sense of indignation in me.
 
Prior to the introduction of the RHAPS, each of the six NUS Halls of Residence (Eusoff, Temasek, Sheares, Kent Ridge, King Edward VII and Raffles) had their own system for admitting residents into the hall.  The RHAPS would create a unified system that would apply to all Halls, allow more foreign students admission and an additional year’s stay in the Halls, and allocate points to more non-Hall activities for the purposes of readmission to the Hall the following year.
 
The Hall residents were upset over various issues.  Some with the reduced number of rooms for local students, others with the fact that there would be less “loyalty” to Hall activities because points would now be allocated to more non-Hall activities.
 
Yet others (including myself) were upset with the lack of real consultation on this matter.  Looking beyond my capacity as a Hall representative (in which capacity I had to point out the above reasons for disagreeing with the RHAPS), I did think that the RHAPS had its merits, but it needed to be tweaked.  However, in typical Singapore fashion, the management sought to impose what it wanted to do without taking the views of affected persons seriously.  I was also upset that the NUS Students’ Union (NUSSU) gave almost unqualified support for the RHAPS, instead of trying to take into consideration of the Halls’ views, whose residents they are also supposed to represent.
 
So the initial effort by the six Combined Halls of Residence (CHR) to constructively engage the NUS administration soon turned into a wrestling match between the CHR on one side, and the NUS administration and NUSSU on the other.  The matter climaxed with the convening of an Extraordinary General Meeting to impeach the NUSSU President, but ultimately the President wasn’t (successfully) impeached.  I’m uncertain if it was because the Halls could not get enough support (it definitely wasn’t a highly organised gladiatorial match which is what funnily I think NUSSU was led to believe) or because the Halls did not seriously wish to impeach the President, that is, the Halls only wanted to express their dissatisfaction with NUSSU and the NUS administration.
 
There was even a website set up by the Halls on the RHAPS.  In the first week of it’s publication it received over 1000 hits and generated a lot of awareness as well as unhappiness with the NUS administration and NUSSU.  I suppose in these early days of the internet (in Singapore), this would be an example of its power as a medium to influence public opinion.
 
The Halls ultimately lost the fight (should I be surprised ?) and the RHAPS was implemented the way the NUS administration wanted it.  I’m going to leave NUS and Eusoff Hall one day so this is no big deal – these heady days of being in the thick of NUS-NUSSU-Hall politics will end after graduation and outcome isn’t going to kill me (it sure diverted a lot of time from my studies though).  But what I found disappointing was that :
 
*  The RHAPS was supposed to reduce the wide discretion that Halls had with respect to the admission of Hall residents (thus reducing “under the table” admissions).  However, the Halls were allowed to retain quite substantial discretion in the admission of residents, the RHAPS notwithstanding.  Was this allowed to remain to “placate” the Halls’ unhappiness ?  If so, while the RHAPS as a unified points system was implemented in form, it was not a substantially more principled way of administering admissions into the Halls.
 
*  True statecraft is the about getting people to adopt your views through persuasion and negotiation.  This was sadly lacking in the entire RHAPS episode and, in my opinion, pretty much characterises how things are often done in Singapore – decisions are first made by the management, and followed up with feedback sessions that management does not intend to take seriously enough to change their initial decisions.  The brute force of authority, rather than the civilised dignity of diplomacy, ultimately carried through the RHAPS.
 
One thing I take away from this sorry RHAPS episode is a bitter aftertaste.  NUS may aspire to be a world class institution.  But how it managed RHAPS was more third world than world class.  This episode certainly has not earned the institution my loyalty; I doubt I will be found amongst the ranks of its alumni members in the future.