Mr Louis Chua, a Member of Parliament ( MP ) for Sengkang GRC, suggested that “ethical lending practices” should be encouraged, apart from raising awareness of the dangers of illicit borrowing.
Stringent regulations on all types of financing, perhaps from licensed moneylenders and banks, to avoid “exorbitant attention rates” and “highly false” charges should also be encouraged to defend borrowers, he added.
Additionally, Mr. Chua urged us to build stronger support techniques for those in financial crisis, offering a range of services, including debt restructuring programs, as well as counseling.
The various organizations that people you contact, as Mr. Lim Biow Chuan, MP for Mountbatten SMC, said.
” Those who come from low-income background should also be aware that there are options available to them for helping them with their money,” he said.
Mr. Melvin Yong, MP for Radin Mas SMC, mentioned the young athletes concern and noted that during his time working as a police officer, he witnessed numerous instances of illegal money financing and observed how it affected those concerned, including young people recruited by mortgage fish.
This encouraged him to make the bi- monthly youth engagement programme, Delta League, in 2011, to employ youths through football and maintain them “meaningfully occupied” during the school holidays.
While , improper moneylending may sound impossible to eradicate, the question then is whether the same can be said of abuse of loans.  ,
As some unregulated lenders may be based abroad, according to Ms. James, it has become” trickier” for local officials to find them.
According to Mr. Vaswani, unregulated moneylending is a “borderless” criminal enterprise because the masterminds may “easily tap” people in Singapore to engage in harassment or private banking lending, regardless of where they are based.  ,
” We must address the root of the issue,” says one source,” but why do people have to borrow money from such sources initially”? Are persons doing so to supply an addiction?  ,
” Or is it to serve their household, in which case the another question to ask is,’ were there no another alternatives?’ Technically, if you strip away the need to acquire from such publications you may gradually dismantle the unlicensed moneylending business, “he said.  ,
Due to the fact that borrowing from these lenders is also prohibited, lawyers also made note that victims of loan- shark harassment are frequently “double bind” victims.  ,
If they report the activity, they might be afraid of getting in trouble themselves. As a result, even if they do come forward, they might be hesitant to provide the full details of the situation, hindering prosecution efforts,” said Ms James.  ,
” This lack of cooperation, stemming from a well- founded fear of violence and potential legal repercussions, makes it significantly harder to build strong cases against the lenders.”
Lawyers contend that tackling the harassment issue can be resolved by addressing the issue of runners and illegal local lenders.  ,
According to Ms. James, “law enforcement can still put pressure on the unlicensed moneylender and their operations by imposing severe sanctions on the runners and local lenders, as well as seizing assets.”
Mr. Vaswani emphasized that the widespread use of police cameras in housing estates and the identification and tracking of suspects engaged in loan shark harassment can greatly hinder illegal moneylending operations.
At the end of the day, reducing inequality is key to ending the” Ah Long “problem, said Assoc Prof Razwana.
We wo n’t be able to completely eradicate unlicensed money lenders as long as there is inequality. However, we could try to minimise the dependency and make it harder for them to operate.”
This article was originally published in , TODAY.  ,