Friday 21 February 2014

Whither SICC?


Having read the past week's newspaper reports and the government's press releases on the topic of re-acquiring land from some golf clubs in Singapore - generally as their leases run out - I ruminated on what this might mean.

The golf club that I have a connection with is the Singapore Island Country Club (SICC) which began life as as two distinct golf clubs - one the exclusive domain of the colonials and, the other golf club, the preserve of the locals.

Both my maternal and paternal grandfathers were among the founding members of the local golf club, the Royal Island Club - or Island Club as it was more commonly referred to.

As a child I spent many happy hours there, sometimes waiting for my paternal grandfather while he finished his round at the 19th hole (to which children were not allowed), so that I could drive home with him.

In those days we were not laden with homework and tuition was not yet a regular part of our daily routine. Instead we spent a healthy amount of time amusing ourselves outdoors at home or at the club's swimming pool. Game Boys, smartphones and other gadgets hadn't been invented yet. Later, when the club built a bowling alley Saturdays were spent bowling in the Junior League.

When I came of age and was eligible to take up membership, I was faced with a dilemma - keep a horse or join the club. I chose to forgo the country club life for a horse, not imagining that one day I would take up golf.

So it was decades later that I returned - to a different club in a different era. A much bigger club in size, number of members and activities. And much more complex.

Gone was the friendly, 'clubby' atmosphere when you knew most of the other members and they knew you. Rules and (petty) regulations plastered and filled up all the space on noticeboards.

Whether intended or not the club of today is the consequence of the 'arranged' marriage of the two clubs that now form SICC and the decision to make memberships freely transferable.

SICC has 7800 members and 18,000 'users' (spouses, children of members). An unprecedented number for a golf or even a country club. 


I found a Wikipedia entry about country clubs and their social implications in Western society:
Country clubs are founded upon the concept of private membership and exclusion of the general public. Country clubs aim to bring people with similar socioeconomic backgrounds together and were never intended to be agencies of social integration.

However in this day and age when many social barriers have fallen or been taken down and there have been great upheavals in both society and the distribution of wealth, not all country clubs are exclusive enclaves of like-minded people from similar backgrounds.

And so it is with SICC.

Furthermore, the club appears to have been marking time with no clear purpose as to what to do when it's leases come up. But now the government has set a deadline - February 2015.

We will lose one 18-hole course (out of four) - or more. And give up some buildings and land.

It would appear (from a recent circular) that the President and General Committee are leaning towards keeping the location where most money has been spent.

Among the ideas they put forward: making the two 18-hole golf courses and the pocket-size 9-hole into five 9-hole courses. 

Personally, I feel that this is going to be much more complex and difficult than it seems. 

As a guiding principle, courses composed two or more full size 9-hole courses had a new 9-holes designed and added. Or were conceived, designed and built to function as two, three or even more separate yet complementary 9-hole courses.

We now say that two courses, separately conceived and designed to operate independently, should be merged and then divided into three 9-hole courses.

And although the Old and New courses now start and end where it is possible to cross over, the better option would be to start off with a clean sheet.

I'm sure there will be objections to closing one or both, but our courses are by no means used to capacity. And we will still have one usable location and two courses for use in the meantime.

Besides one does not move entire clubs and golf courses overnight so the next several years should be spent phasing out and phasing in.

While the Bukit location is slightly smaller, it does contain valuable freehold land. If we gave that up or to be more precise, sold it, would we be adequately compensated? 

To those who are inclined to spend lavishly on buildings and facilities, please keep in mind that all they no longer belong to the club once the land they sit on are handed back.

Besides what sets a club above another is the staff and the service. No doubt, they can get poached - but not if they are happy, properly remunerated and have reasons to remain loyal. HR is often relegated to the back burner and yet this portfolio is vital for now and our future plans.

The white elephant clubhouse that has been suggested we keep is a liability for a club which already has separate clubhouses for swimming and other activities - it's too big for a golf clubhouse and while we have thousands of members, we are not in the F and B business - especially when there are so many other choices for diners.

(We have three imposing clubhouse buildings at the Island location, in excess to our needs. Now, we have to maintain all three at Island and two at Bukit.)

That clubhouse would be better suited to being used as public amenity -  for golf outings and as a MICE extension of Singapore's convention and exhibition business. That's where MBGC would be the fit.

For SICC, keeping it would be throwing good money after bad.


Here is an opportunity to revive SICC as a proper club and we are in danger of messing it up by taking the expedient route, or short view.

We could get world class golf course architects and equally renowned clubhouse architects to see what we have an come up with options - now, that would be money well spent.  

Gary Player and Arnold Palmer have done some good work in Asia - their designs sympathetic to the geography and environment - and have been around for a long time.

Let's not repeat past mistakes.

Keppel Club could continue to exist as a golf club if it had the other 18-hole course and a clubhouse - for which they could compensate SICC. Or Keppel could be 'folded' into Island with MBGC in some other way.

But all this is for the President and GC to ponder - and hopefully provide solutions.

History is not necessarily a predictor of the future, but I hope that the President, GC and members do not forget some 'events' in our not too distant history:


The $100 million ‘white elephant’ Clubhouse at Island, surely a masterpiece of folly.

The starters’ huts at Island which cost over $100,000.

The purchase of 50% more golf carts than needed; everyone dismissed this by saying, “the Club can afford it”. They missed the point entirely.

Were they ‘honest mistakes’, ineptitude or was there much more than meets the eye? No one seemed to care; they were far more interested in who used the invitations to the Masters at Augusta National.

At some point a former general manager was given a golden handshake; his successor, specially recruited from Thailand was presented as a fait accompli, his recruitment and appointment fast-tracked.

Unfortunately, he had to be fired. A subsequent GC re-employed the man with the golden handshake. And then asked him to resign! This is now in the courts.


Throughout all this, the club has more or less run on its own momentum. Staff keep their heads well down and get on with their day-to-day jobs, for better or worse.

If any public company with the financial reserves and resources as SICC were run the same way, the shareholders would be screaming blue murder. 

To exacerbate matters, there are close to 100 members on the GC and sub-committees. Imagine the same public company with 100 shareholders involved in the day-to-day operations of different divisions.

Unfortunately the partially thought out experiment in autonomy at SICC has not worked - but for the government to remove all controls now will be a sure fire recipe for disaster.

Just look at members' clubs in Singapore  - how many stand out for excellence?

(Many have been or are still embroiled in internal squabbles. That should tell us something.)

One of the few exceptions seems to be Sentosa and for a spell they had a GM from Hong Kong. Downie, before he joined Sentosa, was an employee of the Clearwater Bay Golf Club. And he's just been enticed to return to CWB.

Someone said the best clubs in the world are run by dictators.

Jokes aside, maybe we need one to get us out of this situation.

And let's not forget: what is to be done about our huge number of members?

But let's start the land issues on the right track first.