Singapore rises to 7th in global competitiveness

Singapore climbed from eighth to seventh place in the World Economic Forum’s latest ‘global competitiveness index’ and leads the among Asian economies. The annual survey, released on Wednesday, found the United States had retained its status as top dog while Japan suffered a significant drop, falling from fifth to eighth.

The United Kingdom fell from second to ninth.

The rankings are based on a range of factors including quality of institutions, infrastructure, health, education and training, market efficiency, technological readiness and innovation in a country.

Over 11,000 business leaders were polled in a record 131 countries with their main strengths and weaknesses listed.

Singapore ranked top in indicators such as public trust of politicians, transparency of government policy making, quality of infrastructure and its educational system. (story)

Weeping: great way to get court adjourned

Crocodile tears. This is a mockery of the courts. She should be held in contempt and fined for wasting the court’s time. Taxes pay for our legal system so you should be upset too. Cry me a river won’t win you a lawsuit.

“It was her first appearance in the Supreme Court since the trial began a week ago – but it only lasted for less than an hour.

Her daughter, 22-year-old Subashini Jeyabal, was seen in court shaking her head as her mother broke down.

Her inability to compose herself on the stand finally led Justice Lee to adjourn the trial to Thursday.” (story)

Englishman bullies 67 yr old senior

What the Englishman and two of his fellow tourists thought would make a funny video now have them labelled as bullies.

The original video posted up by tourist Mr Bo Davis, 26, was titled “The Slowest Taxi in Southeast Asia” has provoked fiery responses from Netizens.

In the 3 minutes 51 seconds video, the three medium-built guys are seen squeezing onto a trishaw ridden by an elderly man. (story)

Dead newborn found in trash

A dead baby, believed to be a newborn, was found discarded among trash that had been collected from a bin centre located in Havelock Road.The infant was found at about 9.15 Wednesday morning.

A cleaner, 41-year-old Saumi Yun had just collected trash from Blk 96 Havelock Road and dumped it into a garbage truck.

He then went on to his next colllection point at Blk 29, about a 5-minute drive away.

It was as the garbage truck was reversing into the bin centre at Blk 29 that Mr Saumi discovered the motionless infant among the thrash he had collected.

The baby, believed to be a boy, still had his umbilical cord attached. He was wrapped in a blue towel. (story)

Nightclub fined in human trafficking scheme

A nightclub fed the immigration authorities the story that it had hired four Chinese nationals as stage singers.The truth was that the women weren’t even working there, and were paying the club and a middleman to pull this off.

On Wednesday, Grand Century Nite-Club was fined $12,000 for ‘sponsoring’ the women’s immigration passes.

A district court heard that the club applied for the passes for them between December 2004 and July 2005.

The women, aged between 25 and 31 and seeking extensions on their stay here, had approached the club through a middleman.

Each paid the man between $400 and $500 every time she needed to extend their stay; each also paid the club $600 each time she required it to apply for the passes on her behalf. (story)