SINGAPORE: A permanent resident who went to a secondary school in Singapore left the country during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic and defaulted on his national service (NS) obligations. Chinese national You Jiahao, 23, had his permanent residency revoked after he failed to renew his re-entry permit.   He was fined S$9,000 (US$6,940) by a court on Thursday (Jun 25) after pleading guilty to two counts under the Enlistment Act. Another two charges were taken into consideration. The court heard that You obtained Singaporean permanent residency in January 2014 when he was 11. He studied in Outram Secondary School until he was Secondary 4. In March 2016, an exit permit information letter was sent to You's last known registered address, stating that he would be subject to regulations under the Enlistment Act from his 13th birthday. In August 2020, You left Singapore. Months later in April 2021, a registration notice was sent to his address, directing him to log into the NS portal to complete his registration.   You did not register for NS. A police gazette was raised against him after it was discovered that he had left the country. In July 2022, You contacted the Central Manpower Base (CMPB) via email for assistance in renewing his re-entry permit. He acknowledged his duty to serve NS, but asked if he could postpone it until after he completed his studies in China. CMPB told him he had committed offences by failing to register for NS and for remaining outside Singapore without an exit permit, and asked him to return to Singapore. The Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) revoked You's Singapore permanent residency on Aug 1, 2022 because he failed to renew his re-entry permit.   From then on, he was no longer bound to serve NS since he was no longer subject to the Enlistment Act. You did not return to Singapore until Mar 27, 2025, when he was arrested at Changi Airport. He had remained outside Singapore without a valid exit permit for a year, 11 months and six days. The prosecutor sought a fine of at least S$9,000, saying that the period of default was only slightly below the two-year threshold for jail terms. He said the only reason the period was not longer was that ICA had made an administrative decision to revoke You's PR status, rendering him no longer liable to serve NS.   You was unrepresented. In mitigation, he said through an interpreter that he knew he had done wrong. "I know that my actions have had a negative impact on Singapore's national service policy," he said. "It was not my intention to evade my NS obligations. It was during COVID period so I had to return to China and I was not able to return to Singapore." He said he was also unfamiliar with the laws on NS. "I just thought that I had to serve NS after I had finished my university studies. Whatever it is, I have realised my mistake and I have returned to Singapore to deal with this matter," he said. He paid the fine in full. He could have been jailed for up to three years, fined up to S$10,000, or both. Source: CNA/ll(zl)

Of course lah. HAHAHA

Powder keg of stress - for many will chibaboom unless find proper release 

If we strip away the corporate buzzwords like "synergy" and "alignment," putting a high-level Corporate Banking insider like Lim Sim Seng (former DBS Singapore Country Head and Chief of Consumer Banking) at the helm of a massive public merger serves a very specific, deliberate purpose.   A corporate banking veteran brings several hard-nosed capabilities to this type of restructuring that traditional bureaucrats or lifelong academics simply don't possess.   ### 1. Ruthless Legacy System Integration   Merging two massive statutory boards (SSG and WSG) means smashing together completely different legacy IT architectures, databases, and client portals. In his banking days, Lim oversaw consumer banking—the literal engines that handle millions of customer accounts, transactions, and security protocols daily.    * **The Banking Edge:** Retail banks are masters of "back-office centralization." A banking insider knows how to ruthlessly audit overlapping infrastructure, strip out redundant systems, and force two separate entities into a single, unified data ecosystem. For the public, this is intended to turn two messy portals into one seamless "Careers and Skills Passport."   ### 2. Upgrading Data Infrastructure ("Fintech" Mindset) During his time at DBS, Lim was part of the leadership team that pushed the "we are a technology company doing banking" philosophy. He famously tried to apply this exact mindset when he chaired the Building and Construction Authority (BCA), urging the construction sector to stop doing "same old, same old."    * **The Banking Edge:**    He will view the new SWDA not as a welfare office, but as a data-and-tech platform. Expect him to push the agency to behave like a tech-driven marketplace—using AI and predictive predictive data analytics to aggressively match a worker's real-time skills profile with actual employer vacancies, similar to how banks algorithmically cross-sell financial products based on user behavior.   ### 3. Aggressive "Tripartite" Corporate Diplomacy   SkillsFuture and Workforce Singapore can design the best training programs in the world, but they fail completely if corporations refuse to hire the graduates.    * **The Banking Edge:**    As a former country head of Singapore's largest bank, Lim has deep personal relationships with the C-suites, Managing Directors, and CEOs of Singapore’s biggest employers and multinational corporations (MNCs). He speaks their language fluent in corporate KPIs, return-on-investment (ROI), and risk management. He can act as a high-level bridge to demand that major industries explicitly state what skills they need, forcing local companies to put skin in the game regarding workforce transformation.   ### 4. Cold-Eyed Fiscal Discipline and Fraud Prevention   SkillsFuture has historically been plagued by high-profile multi-million dollar subsidy scams, where rogue training providers exploited loopholes to claim public funds for fake courses.    * **The Banking Edge:** Commercial banks operate under some of the strictest regulatory, anti-fraud, and risk-management frameworks in the world. A banking insider brings an obsessive focus on auditing, financial governance, and systemic risk mitigation. He will likely look at the SWDA’s massive disbursement pipelines (like the SkillsFuture Level-Up funds) through a risk-compliance lens, ensuring much tighter checks and balances on how public money is handed out to training providers.   > **The Skeptical Takeaway:** Lim Sim Seng is not there to hold hands or write soft policy. He is an operational mechanic brought in to treat the merger like a major corporate acquisition. The big test for his two-year term will be whether he can streamline the plumbing of the system without making the agency so intensely metrics-driven that it loses sight of the vulnerable, less tech-savvy Singaporeans who need human career coaching the most. >