There seems to be a disturbing pattern emerging in Singapore lately; the leniency of the courts….when it comes to racists, that is. First there was the light sentence given to Muhammad Sadiq Syed Kadir, who was only given 12 weeks jail, a 5 year driving ban and an SG$1000 fine for manslaughter, road rage and racial slurs. Now there’s this pitiful excuse for a stateless man.
Periyanayagam Appavoo, 52, has been sentenced to jail for 5 weeks for hurling racial abuses at medical staff and trying to choke out a nurse like he was in the UFC. That’s not all, the kicker is he did this while still being investigated for another crime; using racial slurs at a staff at NTUC.
Yeah, that set people off.
A ton of people view his sentence as too lenient, especially given his history of criminal behaviour, the severity of the crime (assaulting a nurse is heinous!) and his racist behaviour.
Netizens didn’t waste time to jump on the bandwagon denouncing his despicable acts, though the majority of them didn’t really understand his situation.
While I’m in support of their enthusiastic response, sending him back to India isn’t an option at all sadly.
That’s because while he might be technically stateless, the fact is he might be as Singaporean as you and me. That term, Stateless? It doesn’t mean what you think it means.
Confused?
Don’t worry, you’re not alone.
The general sentiment online (apart from wanting him to be punished) is of confused netizens who have no idea what the term ‘Stateless’ means or thinks it’s something similar to what Tom Hank’s character in The Terminal was.
Not wrong…but not really right.
Here’s what Google terms it as in reference to Singapore.
Judging that he’s been here since at least the 80s, chances are he’s not a PR or a kid born to a foreign national who’s stateless. The simple reason is that he’s part of a very rare group of locals who aren’t able to prove they were born here because of lost records.
In case that’s too dry, here’s another (more relatable) version.
So those people wanting to send him back to India? Tough luck because he’s not from there. He’s from here.
You know what that means, right?
Stateless or not, he’s another racist local…which Netizens aren’t happy about.
There might be (however slim) a chance, that all his criminal acts aren’t villainous at all.
Stateless people in Singapore don’t have a ton of opportunities to eke our a living here. They don’t have the options available to us because technically they’re in limbo. How to get a legal job with CPF when you don’t even have an NRIC? How to buy a house?
That’s why some Netizens think his antics are actually a cry for help from a desperate man.
I’m inclined to believe them too.
I don’t know whether I’m naïve or what, but I don’t believe that any Singaporean can be truly despicable enough to be racist to medical staff. It might truly be that everything he does is actually an act to be arrested and thrown in jail for the benefits.
Then again, maybe I’m a fool.
At least I’m not like this scammer in the very same comment section though.
Poor dude had a hard-on for Eugene Zheng so much he stalked him online and even gave out his number. It’s pretty weird, as +1 is the American country code and that (209) seems to be a Californian county code. Not exactly where you’d expect scammers to come from.
Weird or not, even a scammer is more welcome than scum and troll wanna-be Silas Fenix.
Poor Silas is such a failure as a troll that his multiple attempts at trying to goad out responses got zero replies.
He tried attacking the Malays, the Chinese, the Indians…he even tried defending Periyanayagam Appavoo.
Nobody paid any mind to attention deficit Silas.
Don’t worry though, I’m noting your racist actions.