Ready for crisis

The inaugural island-wide Exercise SG Ready was launched this year on Total Defence Day.

Don't be alarmed if you're hanging around the City Hall area this evening and the lights suddenly go off. It's all part of the Exercise SG Ready, the nation's first Total Defence exercise.

At about 8.30pm, the façade lights of locations such as the State Courts, National Gallery and the Padang will be turned off to simulate a power disruption.

This is one of several power, water, food supply and digital connectivity disruptions held across the island today to get Singaporeans thinking about whether they are ready for disruptions to their daily lives.

Keeping Total Defence alive

Exercise SG Ready was officially launched on the morning of 15 Feb, at the Total Defence Day Commemoration Event (TDDCE) held at South Beach Tower.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance Lawrence Wong delivered his Total Defence Day message via video to mark the start of the island-wide exercise, which saw more than 50 organisations – including schools and business corporations – participating in planned disruptions throughout the day.

Speaking at the TDDCE, Defence Minister Dr Ng Eng Hen underscored the continued importance of Total Defence, highlighting how certain countries have been unable to summon self-defence in times of crisis after having cancelled National Service.

"(These examples) teach us in Singapore to be thankful that the previous and current generations have kept up our Total Defence to this day. It will ultimately be Total Defence that will help us remain prepared, adaptable and resilient to overcome turbulent times," he said.

Uncovering vulnerabilities

Dr Ng also met with Chief Executive Officers of businesses in South Beach Tower which were participating in Exercise SG Ready.

Among the participating businesses was Bain & Company. The global management consultancy firm carried out a power and water disruption exercise, in which they turned off the water supply in the office pantry and provided staff with water bags from the Public Utilities Board (PUB).

The company also carried out a phishing drill to raise awareness among staff and partners of email phishing scams, using guidelines from the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore's playbooks.

Bain & Company's Southeast Asia Chairman, Mr Edmund Lin, found that the exercise was effective in jolting the staff out of their complacency when it came to phishing emails.

"A small number of our employees were actually tricked by the phishing email! What we found is that we are all vulnerable, and if we are not vigilant, we won't be able to protect ourselves," said the 54-year-old.

He added: "In a post-pandemic experience, resilience is really critical. We're living in an economically challenging environment. If our own employees don't have the required resilience, it will be hard for us to deliver effectively to our clients and business partners. This exercise is a wonderful way for us to put this to the test."

Not taking peace & stability for granted

As part of the exercise, Esplanade MRT station turned off one of its downward-riding escalators to simulate a power disruption. The crowds heading to lunch, most of whom were working in the vicinity and were aware of the ongoing Exercise SG Ready, were unfazed and made use of the staircases instead.

Ms Munah Shaik Mohamed, who was on her way to lunch with her colleague and daughter, thought that the disruptions were useful for bringing awareness to younger Singaporeans used to the peace and stability.

Said the 45-year-old Human Resource Business Partner: "An exercise like this is helpful, especially for the younger generation who have not experienced such hardships and disruptions. Those of us who are not so young would have been through this and have the awareness.

"People who are very used to the conveniences may be irked by the disruptions, but it's all for the good of the country."

Mr Glenn Ng, who also worked at South Beach Tower, had a sound plan in place in the event of an emergency. Asked how he would respond to a disruption to network connectivity, the 54-year-old Country Sales Manager noted that the first thing to do was to physically check if his wife and their four children were safely at home.

His next step would be to try and track down those who were still outside to ensure their safety. They would then take stock of the drinking water at home and ration their water usage until they could obtain more water.

"This exercise has been a good experience. A lot of people might take things for granted. It's only when a situation like this happens, that they realise things can go wrong."