The new leadership at AWARE has done great disservice to the organization and to all Singaporean women
April 20th, 2009 | 
Author: Written by Ng E-Jay
20 April 2009
The new President of the Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE), Ms Josie Lau Meng Lee, has told the media that she hopes for reconciliation with existing members following the highly controversial leadership change on March 28, and that an extraordinary general meeting (EOGM) will be held soon to provide an opportunity for an open discussion. According to the newly setup facebook group entitled “We believe that recent events at AWARE concerns us all” created by Ms Olivia Tan, the EOGM will be held on 02 May, Saturday, from 2pm to 5pm, at First Choice Auditorium, HSR Building.
Ms Lau and AWARE’s new honorary treasurer Ms Maureen Ong appeared on Channel News Asia’s half-hour Talking Point programme aired on Sunday night. They said they could not understand why the AWARE old guard had been unhappy with the change, and that their takeover was not a coup, as “they had only just got to know each other“. (Straits Times, “Aware chief wants to heal rift with upset members”, 20 April 2009)
The new leadership of AWARE must think the general public is made up of complete fools. From the moment they took over the reigns of office at AWARE, they have been non-transparent about their motives and intentions, and they have refused to explain adequately why so many new members ran for office despite having not made any significant contribution to AWARE, or worse still, despite not even being able to articulate what AWARE’s values are.
The new leadership also took draconian and undemocratic steps to alienate the old leadership, such as unceremoniously sacking Ms Braema Mathi from her position as chairman of AWARE’s Cedaw Committee. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (Cedaw) is an international convention adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1979 — Singapore acceded to this treaty in 1995. Countries under the treaty submit two reports, one by the state and another by an advocacy group, every four years to a UN committee which then issues recommendations on compliance. Ms Mathi has been involved in preparing the Cedaw report since 2004. The new leadership of AWARE has not disclosed why they abruptly dumped Ms Mathi, at a time when she was in the midst of finishing a second Cedaw report with the help of more than 20 volunteers. (Straits Times, “Sacked by a terse e-mail”, 19 April 2009)
In a letter explaining her decision to resign from the post of Immediate Past President, which was released to the mainstream media over the weekend, Ms Constance Singam wrote that her advice on a number of issues had been ignored by the new Exco, despite her experience at AWARE. She also said: “… in private meetings, the Exco showed a complete lack of respect for me, ignoring my advice and even keeping me out of an Exco meeting when I had the right to be there as stated in the constitution“.
Both Ms Singam and Ms Claire Nazar, the former President who resigned just a few days into her tenure, also lamented that about a week after the AGM on March 28, AWARE’s new Exco had replaced almost all the appointed chairpersons of sub-committees with new Exco members. This broke with AWARE’s long-standing practice of giving more women outside the Executive Committee the opportunity to acquire leadership skills through experience in sub-committee work. In her letter, Ms Singam wrote that she reminded the new Exco that the coordinators have been working on these issues for some time and that summarily replacing them would be disrespectful and counter-productive. However, her views were ignored.
The actions of AWARE’s new Exco run directly contradictory to their publicly stated stand that they would honour AWARE’s founders and build on the good work of past members.
The apparent anti-gay stance of some of the new members of AWARE are also of concern, given that they have only recently joined the organization and have thus far been tight-lipped about their views towards sexual minorities.
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8 Responses to “The new leadership at AWARE has done great disservice to the organization and to all Singaporean women”
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deh… why u all so judgmental and kancheong_spider??
what serious damage if any has been done by them that is a great disservice. have they lost big time on some minibonds or took $$ for meaningless rescues of banks?
leemember, ever the so islamic fundamentalist Anwar Ibrahim has mellow down over the years to prove himself to be a decisive leader when he shoulders greater responsibilities.
so without giving them time to do anything, and burning bridges even before they come to it, everything is you say become holy gosphel lor. lidat win liaoz, what’s there to argue. this reallly take after the mentalities of some pple who accuse TLH of being a chinese, anti christian chauvinist. i reallee dunno much abt the anti christain part, but a chinese chauvinist seems so obvious the hallmark of Caesar’s senators.
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Take it easy, buddies! Let Ms Josie and her new committee settle down and prove themselves first beofre you bring down the sledgehammer. Okay?
Oh Tham Eng, what more “proving of themselves” do we need?
Many of them have already established their anti-gay track record like you. And they come from a church – the Church of our Saviour – that perpetrates an especially antagonistic attitude towards gays.
Perhaps what you really mean is “let them cause the harm to gays while they are still occupying these positions” because by that time the damage would have been done and may be irreversible.
josie lau and co has the right to their own opinion, but why the need to hijack another organisation when they can start their own? Why force their opinion down other people’s throats? It’s quite disrespectful.
ancheong spider – the harm in not in monetary terms, but the fact that an organistion’s 25 years of hard work trying to get society to take women’s issues seriously is flushed down the toilet by this “catfight”. The work they have done for ALL women, is now relagated to just oh they are a pro-lesbian group. The inability to manage all this harmful negative PR for the organisation, or simply just gain the trust and respect of older members is already a sign of the new exco’s incompetent leadership.
“Appearances are deceptive.”
A Wolf found great difficulty in getting at the sheep owing to the vigilance of the shepherd and his dogs.
But one day it found the skin of a sheep that had been flayed and thrown aside, so it put it on over its own pelt and strolled down among the sheep.
The Lamb that belonged to the sheep, whose skin the Wolf was wearing, began to follow the Wolf in the Sheep’s clothing; so, leading the Lamb a little apart, he soon made a meal off her, and for some time he succeeded in deceiving the sheep, and enjoying hearty meals.
Appeareances have fooled people.
In the recent Aware episode, a cunning, egoistic, self-righteous, hungry for power woman, proclaimed herself to be a feminist had been vying and targeting Aware for many years. And at the opportune moment together with the insidious church pastor, they used poison pen emails which contained the most unpleasant, abusive and malicious statements to accuse the previous Aware leadership of promoting and promulgating Gay activities in Singapore. Undeservingly, using God’s name, and Singapore’s interest, they instigated, designed and launched the most indignified coup to take over the control of Aware in lightning speed, followed by blatantly ostracizing all the old guards who have spent so many past years and contributed positively to the development of Aware. They have downgraded the image of Aware and stained the chairs they now sit on, in their dirty attempt to gain Aware leadship.
This is a sad day for Aware, and it shows how schemeful, despicable, and shameless some people who think they are moral vigilantes can turn out to be.
Hello, you bring shame to Christianity and Singapore. You have shamed all Singapore women too. You are not fit to be a model for my children.
The so called new leadership of Aware, headed by Jose Lau and your running dogs,, shame on you.. please resign before more shame come your way,,,,
Agape xue
The Church Wants To Over AWARE
It is clear the church wants to make use of religion to take over AWARE. This is not an internal conflict among the members. There is infiltration by the church members. The church is interfering in the internal affairs of a secular organization. This is going to cause a religious conflict. The government must do something to prevent the conflict.
The minister has spoken. We should build a “rainbow coalition”.
Building the rainbow coalition is for the interest of our nation.
I hope members of the new exco of AWARE understand, resign and leave. This is a sensible thing to do.
The AWARE saga shows the danger of religious brainwashing making highly educated people to lose their sensibility. It is good to be moderately religious but dangerous to be extremely religious. Extremists tend to lose their heads in heaven forgetting that their feet are still on the ground.
We need laws when we discard the values. According to the law, members of the new exco have won but according the ethics and values, they have lost. It is a sad thing that their lives are guided by laws and not by values. As Christians, it is a disgrace that their lives are not guided by values. God guides them through the values. Throw away the values and they will be guided by Satan in the name of God.
What is Sacrifice?
The word sacrifice is made of two parts. The first part of the word, sacri, comes from the Latin root word sacrare meaning, “to make sacred or holy”. The second part of the word, fice, means “to make” or “to offer”. So, the meaning of sacrifice is to make one holy or sacred by making an offering.
External sacrifice at the highest level is to offer one’s life. Many freedom fighters gave up their lives for their countries. Parents offered their sons to fight for freedom in France, America, India, China and many other countries.
Others sacrifice by giving their possessions.
Many parents sacrifice for their children.
Sacrifice at the lowest level is to offer a lamb by killing it. In fact, this is a misinterpretation of sacrifice by someone with the scapegoat mentality. If this scapegoat interpretation is popular, it is because many people have the scapegoat mentality. Our belief is a reflection of our mentality.
This religion is a teaching of scapegoatism for people and by people having the scapegoat mentality. “Birds of a feather flock together”. The offering of the lamb as a sacrifice is a ritual based on the story of Abraham. This story must be written by someone influenced by the scapegoat mentality.
Sacrifice at the highest level leads one to the inner sacrifice. External sacrifice is a means leading finally to an inner sacrifice. When we throw our imperfections into our conscience, the inner flame, Agni, we become more perfect and holy.
John 3 : 16
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”
In the Bible, John 3: 16, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ was also given a scapegoat interpretation!
This was a report. This reporter was greater than God. He could read God’s mind.
Mark 16:19
“So then, when the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God.”
God did not give His only begotten Son. Jesus went back and “sat down at the right hand of God.”
When you give something and get it back, it is not giving.
If I have a son who can come back and sit at my right hand after he dies, I will happily send him to fight in the wars and die a hundred times.
True sacrifice does not mean sacrificing a scapegoat.