UPDATE on Tuesday, June 6: The RC and overseeing MP Yee Chia Hsing have responded to Tan's account of the incident. Read their statements here.

In a society where it is said that Singaporeans are not self-starters, have no initiative and rely too much on the government, this story is a rather unfortunate one.

Meet Uncle Tan, a 73-year-old former fishing and shipyard worker who quit his job in a lifelong quest to better understand plants, herbs and their healing properties.

For the past 14 years, he painstakingly grew a community herb garden in the vicinity of Block 938, Jurong West Street 91, where he lives, which boasts a wide variety of herbs and plants.

Over the years, he has weathered plot after plot of land being closed or taken away from him for other uses.

People have gone to him for unofficial consultations on various ailments, and for a time, when he brewed and served herbal tea three times a week, visited to drink tea too.

But now, all that is going to naught. In a Facebook post addressed to his community garden volunteers last Thursday, Tan shared that his last day working on the garden was Wednesday, May 31.

The reason: Tricky regulations

Tan stressed in his post that he was not bullied by members of the Residents' Committee, but in an update posted on Monday, June 5, he said "the MP and RC had already made their stance clear".

In his post, he said:

"Ultimately, my withdrawal from the herb garden was due to irreconcilable differences with the RC, in terms of how the herb garden should be run, which contravened with my personal values and beliefs.

The RC felt that the Blk 938 herb garden had expanded beyond the original aim and remit of a community garden and should be scaled down accordingly."

Tan hinted that there were "misunderstandings and petty arguments" between him and the RC over the years that he had been operating his garden in Jurong West, and that administratively, it was in recent years becoming increasingly difficult for him to continue with his garden's operations.

While he operated the garden in a very open manner, allowing visitors and volunteers from anywhere and everywhere, and accepting donations in cash or kind to support his operations in exchange for free consultations, herbs and more.

It grew in popularity, though, and Tan wrote that the RC became concerned that there were legal implications to giving out unlicensed herbs for usage — because what if, for instance, someone complained about side effects from them? — and they did not want to be liable for these issues.

These concerns were based on "imaginary and unfounded" fears, wrote Tan, but nonetheless gave rise to conditions including:

- People who are not living in the Nanyang area were not allowed to volunteer with Tan's garden; and

- Parts of the herb garden — the precise space of which were to be determined by the RC — were to be converted for other uses.

On the hunt for new garden space

Now, Tan says he is searching for a new space to set up shop. He recently opened a new garden space in Kranji, with many donors coming forward to support his effort.

"Starting a new garden is back-breaking and involved a lot of hard work, I am already 73 year old... it is unlikely that I have another 14 years..... however, I will persevere and persist ...because I want to show the younger generations what it means to be brave and selfless; always putting the society before oneself !!"

He ended with this strange few lines, though:

"During the meeting, the RC said that they would be happy to let the herb garden continue in its current form if someone in a high position with authority is willing to step forward to take responsibility.

Do you guys know of any MP or Minister who would be wise and brave enough to bear the responsibility of this garden so that we can continue to operate in its current form ?

Well I guess, its all too late by now..."

We checked, Tan's block comes under Chua Chu Kang GRC, headed by Health Minister Gan Kim Yong, and MPs Yee Chia Hsing, Low Yen Ling and Zaqy Mohamad.

Read his full Facebook post here: