Singaporeans are all too familiar with the term “ownself check ownself”, where one is responsible for his/her actions without being accountable to independent parties. It’s a term made famous during the 2015 General Elections by Workers’ Party politician Pritam Singh — sort of like the local version of “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” (Who watches the watchmen?)
If that’s too tepid an explanation, we’ll just leave this video here for you:
In a viral Facebook post, a poster put up by the Marine Parade Town Council shows a “cleaning team” consisting of one and only one man: a worker named Moktar, assuming the dual roles of cleaner and cleaning supervisor. It’s truly a manifestation of “Ownself Check Ownself”. Bravo, man. Bravo.
It makes for a more striking fact that one of the Members of Parliament (MPs) in the Marine Parade Town Council is Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, who was especially hardline about the ruling People’s Action Party not needing opposition politicians because they can keep themselves in check. Welp, looks like they believe in it so much they let Moktar handle everything by himself.
