Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Protecting a democratic institution

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Protecting a democratic institution

The recent change in leadership in AWARE (Association of Women for Research and Education) has raised issues of concern. The old leadership, comprising of volunteers who has worked for many years to build up the values and stature of the organisation was unexpected toppled by a group of new members who voted in a new committee at the annual general meeting.

To my collection, this type of unplanned leadership change has occurred in some other organisations in the past. The new leadership represent the views of a small group of people who attended the annual general meeting, and does not reflect the membership at large.

What can be done to preserve the democratic nature of an organisation and ensure that the elected leaders reflect the values of the membership?

Here are a few possible approaches:

1. Nominations for elected office should be submitted at least 14 days in advance of the general meeting. The nominees should be required to submit a statement to show their background and their plans for the organisation.

2. Voting should be allowed for all members, rather than those who attend the general meeting. With today's technology, it should be quite easy to vote through the internet. Those who attend the meeting can vote on the spot.

Many organisations in Singapore are weak. People are not prepared to serve in the committee. Each general meeting see the return of a few of the well known figures. Occasionally, an upset election results create big news.

We have to address these long standing problems. It is time for us to build stronger democratic institutions in Singapore.

Tan Kin Lian

2 comments:

zhummmeng said...: The old committee were caught sleeping or with their skirts down.
They deserve it. They were complacent old birds who lost their goals and vision.How they got themselves voted out is no surprise. A change in leadership was inevitable and in fact is welcomed by members who were tired of the old fat guards.
This reminds me of another old, nearly gone defunct and obsolete association, sleeping for at least 30 years and woke up one day and found that it was about to be a fossilized dinosaur.This is the Insurance and Financial Practitioners of Singapore (IFPAS)formerly known as Life Underwriter Association (what a prehistoric name and anachronism). When Financial Planning Association of Singapore(FPAS) came on the scene IFPAS was kalang kabot and desperately grabbed anything it could find resulting in choosing a name very close to the legitimate FPAS and not only that,and not to look stupid IFPAS started offering another designation to challenge FPAS and again for want of a better name it rolled out a designation very close to the internationally accredited CFP. IFPAS started ChFP which at a glance could be confused with CFP.To cut the story short IFPAS was sued and out of court agreed to add another 'F" to ChFP to become FChFP. In a way IFPAS was 'F" and it deserved it for jumping on other's bandwagon.
This is another example of a association too complacent and comfortable operating like an exclusive club without any long term direction.It could have been the leader in the promotion of financial planning instead it was contented to operate as an association of sales insurance agents.It was only interested to promote insurance selling and not financial planning until its existence was threatened. It was an association of sales people whose interest was to push products even till today. Sadly , there are many association started off with lofty goals only to fizzle out as time goes by. The vision is lost and the mission gone astray and haywire.; April 14, 2009 11:17 PM
Soojenn said...: Yes, the old exco deserved to be booted out since they were just sitting on their laurels and expected a walkover in the AGM, to the extent that they think that they do not need many of their members to attend?

If there is real passion in their work and value of what they believe they had done, where are all the supporters?

AGM's are generally supposed to be a meeting where the exco present their work, what they have achieved for the past and what they plan for the future, and not what the last exco has prepared for. Well, this is presumably because they are overconfident of themselves, and their aility, leading to compacency. It doesn't appear to be much of an AGM without the newcomers.

Your suggestions to preserve the "democratic values" smacks clearly of your past indoctrination by the PAP?

If the members are not free to attend, then they should sign proxy forms, as in any other AGM, why through the internet? The AGM notice is usually informed to members way in advanced, and if the organization is sufficiently important to them, they should allocate time to attend this. Hello, this is onlt once a year, NOT every month!

It wuld be interesting if you use your analogy with the coming GE. Will you be suggesting for the voting to be through the internet?; April 18, 2009 12:24 PM