if the local papers were to propagate the use of good English, they would fail miserably, no offence intended. Amidst countless grammatical errors that are hesitantly forgivable, it is shocking how the premier newspaper of Southeast Asia is a repeat offender in what English teachers tell their students not to do. Case in point, you say something is 'white' and not 'white in colour', as per mentioned in the sunday times. flipping through the pages a while ago, i also noticed the use of 'repeat again' instead of merely repeat.
By saying the object is white, one is already stating the colour, hence no further need to do a double take by saying 'white in colour'. similarly, repeat means going over again. to say repeat again, thus means to say the same thing not once more, but twice more.
Singlish is causing enough embarassment already. Don't perpetuate the problem by allowing this to extend to 'singlish sentence structure'. There are other ways of creating a unique Singapore. Bastardising the English language is just not one of them.
