Talents by assumption worth millions

Talents, leadership and meritocracy,

By assumptions worth millions,

Clothed in Confucianism or Asian values,

Add a little fizz and sparkle,

Never short of ideas or talents,

To create higher standards of living

To reach Swiss standard of living,

To restructure to value-adding economy,

Fill people with hope, dreams and long-term good,

To bite the bullet or pills of pragmatism,

Bear the pain to pay double on lands already owned,

Triple the costs on vehicle to beat traffic woes,

First the excise, then COE, came ERP,

Pay and pay with no end to fee increase,

Corporatise transport, medicare and utilities,

To tax and recover all costs through creative accounting,

Till businesses go bust and citizens suffer joblessness,

Asian crisis, Asset collapses, and deepest of recessions

Leadership and talents by assumptions,

Put to test by crisis and recessions,

Behold citizens were told crises world phenonmenon,

Nothing to do with leadership or assumptions,

Citizens told not to be choosy, and go for re-training,

Recessions beyond control of million-dollar ministers,

At long last world economy turns the corner,

Talents, leadership, Asian values quickly recover,

With loud assertions of leadership as strong as ever,

That without leadership there would be chaos,

That high costs of living is not a problem,

Over-40s educated unemployed was a structural problem

Scant were mention of NKF or 20 major policy errors

None was mentioned of lack of technology minister

Capable of broad-based education, or mass knowledge application,

In short this rest leadership by assumptions worth by the millions.