Current Affairs Group (CAG)/Policy Gaming in SAFRA

When I joined SAFRA in May 1987, I was assigned to be the Programme Executive of the Current Affairs Group or CAG.  The Chairman was Wee Leong How.  He was also the Management Committee member who interviewed me for the job.  He was my first contact with volunteers in SAFRA.  His predecessor was the late Colonel (Volunteer) Richard Hin Yung.  Richard was volunteer not only in SAFRA but also with the SAF.

My task in CAG was to organize activities that would engage reservists in current affairs.  We did this through organizing talks and events.  I remember inviting eminent speakers in their respective fields including Dr Retnam (a specialist in STD who worked at the Middle Road skin clinic) who spoke on the AIDs epidermic; Dr Bilveer Singh who spoke on the topic 'Singapore's Threat Perception'.

The most memorable talk that I organized for CAG was 'Singapore - Then and Now' by the late Dr David Marshall, Singapore's first Chief Minister who was then Ambassador to France. 

It was held at the Tampines auditorium to full capacity 

 I still remember using the telex machine in our general office to type the invitation to Dr Marshall who was based in Paris.  This was done during one of the weekends - and when I saw his reply on the following Monday, I was very excited and happy.  He replied that he was happy to speak to our members as he was returning to celebrate his 80th Birthday.

We had Dr Kwa Chong Guan who was then Director of Museum to chair the talk.  I remember the lunch we hosted for Dr Marshall who chose the Japanese restaurant in the Shangri-la Hotel.  The lunch was to brief him on CAG and SAFRA.

Dr Marshall was very sprite and lucid for his age - he mentioned about failing eyesight (which was why he had 'readers' at the embassy to literally read the newspapers and documents to him.  He had carried a voice recorder to remind himself of tasks.  In fact, while we were eating, he recorded some instructions that he said was to be handed to his secretaries.

There were some tense moments during his talk though.  A member of the audience was visibly worked up when he commented that Dr Marshall had abandoned the opposition when he gave up politics.  Dr Marshall was really in his element - he was very composed and calmly replied that politics required a certain ruthlessness that he felt he did not have.  He of course quoted Margaret Thatcher that to be in politics, one must be prepared to take the proverbial bullet.  

One of the themes of his talk was that we should as a society reflect if we work to live or live to work.  Somehow, this sound very relevant today. 

CAG was to progress into another major project in SAFRA - Policy-gaming.  It was an idea we felt would involve reservists more in the policy thinking and making processes.  Three were organized with teams of reservists forming cabinets of ministers.  We were fortunate to obtain the help and resource from the various government ministries to provide data as well as guidance.

The three topics that the shadow cabinets deliberated were:

(a) Emigration - Problems & Solutions
(b) Singapore's Economic And Security Policies & Role of ASEAN in the post-Cambodia period
(c) Prevention of Traffic Congestion in Singapore

I was reminded that the idea of COE (though at that point it was not named this way) was first floated by the teams of policy-gaming.  If the source was correct, then the impact of a simple game by a group of volunteers had certainly left its mark for so many years since the implementation of COE in Singapore's transport system.