Impact of Electoral Boundary Changes on Votes

It has been posited that changes in electoral boundaries do not affect the country-wide distribution of votes.

It's not correct.

Die-hard PAP and Opposition supporters will vote PAP and Opposition, respectively, regardless of whether they are in one constituency or another.

But voters in the middle ground or who haven't made up their minds will assess the candidates standing for election in their constituencies.

If the candidates are incumbents, especially if they are from a constituency that the voters have moved to or have been moved to by the Electoral Boundaries Committee, have the incumbents lived up to the voters' expectations in Parliament (how often have they been present, how many questions have they asked and what is the quality of these questions, how often have they presented suggestions and what is the quality of their suggestions) and in looking after the constituents and the constituencies?

If the candidates are incumbents in single member constituencies that have been absorbed into group representation constituencies, the other members of the group will have to be assessed as well.

If the candidates are not the incumbents, do they or their party deserve your vote?

In conclusion, it's not correct to think that changes in electoral boundaries do not affect the country-wide distribution of votes.

Losing Gan Kim Yong

Deputy prime minister Gan Kim Yong was moved from Chua Chu Kang GRC to Punggol GRC, presumably to fortify People's Action Party team in Punggol GRC against a strong The Workers' Party team led by Senior Counsel Harpreet Singh Nehal.

What if Punggol GRC voters voted out PAP and with it, Mr Gan?

1. PAP parachuted Mr Gan from a relatively safe Chua Chu Kang GRC to Punggol GRC. Should Punggol GRC voters feel compelled to vote for PAP just to keep Mr Gan in the Cabinet? Why should this responsibility fall on them?

2. Mr Gan would stand a higher chance of being re-elected if he stayed in Chua Chu Kang GRC although even there, there are uncertainties resulting from parts of Tengah being added to it and Bukit Gombak ward being removed from it and made into an SMC.

3. Mr Gan would stand a good chance of being re-elected if he were parachuted to an SMC. PAP used to think, and probably still thinks, that GRCs makes the party impregnable against the opposition. Until Aljunied GRC fell to WP in 2011 and Sengkang GRC fell, also to WP, in 2020. As more GRCs fall to the opposition, PAP may just abolish GRCs, which are absurd?

4. How important or indispensable is Mr Gan? He was not elected to PAP's Central Executive Committee late last year nor even co-opted, even though he was DPM then. So strange.

5. PAP should learn to govern with half the seats plus one in Parliament. Any more is a bonus.

6. The number of political office holders is mind boggling. There are ministers, senior ministers of state, ministers of state, senior parliamentary secretaries and parliamentary secretaries.

Political Ambush

A surreptitiously recorded video of Mr Leon Perera stroking the hand of Ms Nicole Seah in a seemingly intimate manner came into the public realm in the morning of 17 July 2023.

To recap.

Mr Perera was one of The Workers' Party Members of Parliament for Aljunied GRC and a member of WP's Central Executive Committee.

Ms Seah was also a member of WP's Central Executive Committee and in WP's team that narrowly lost in the East Coast GRC in the 2020 General Elections. She was considered by many to be a rising star in not just WP but also national politics.

Both Mr Perera and Ms Seah are married to other people.

According to WP's Secretary-General Pritam Singh, both Mr Perera and Ms Seah admitted their affair, which started after the 2020 GE. but said that it had stopped some time ago. They had previously denied any affair after Mr Perera's driver alleged that they were meeting very often at restaurants and hotels and had been seen hugging each other and holding hands.[1]

By 19 July 2023, Mr Perera and Ms Seah had resigned from WP. Mr Singh said, “The Constitution of WP requires candidates to be honest and frank in their dealings with the party and the people of Singapore. Leon’s conduct and not being truthful when asked by the party leadership about the allegations fell short of the standards expected of WP MPs. This is unacceptable. Had he not offered his resignation, I would have recommended to the CEC that he be expelled from the party.”[2]

Nothing in Singapore law requires any MP to resign because of an extramarital affair.

Why is the video significant?

Recorded more than a year ago, it was not made public until mere hours before Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong's press conference announcing the resignations from the People's Action Party and Parliament of Speaker of Parliament Tan Chuan-jin and PAP Member of Parliament Cheng Li Hui. Mr Tan (who is married) and Ms Cheng (who is single) had continued their affair despite their being counselled by PM Lee earlier in 2023.

Was the timing of the release of the video a coincidence?

Or was it timed to soften the impact of Mr Tan's extramarital affair on the ruling People's Action Party?

When did the person(s) who had, or had access to, the video originally intend to make it public? A damaging moment might be at the next general election just after nominations had closed. As WP would be unable to change its slate of candidates, it could spell electoral doom for WP in one or more GRCs.

Are there matters that certain person(s) are holding in abeyance, waiting to politically ambush WP's (or any other opposition party's) candidates at the next general election?

Notes

1. WP’s Leon Perera, Nicole Seah resign over extramarital affair which started after GE2020 (The Straits Times, 19 July 2023).

2. Ibid.

Deprived of Their Right to Vote

As many as 1,093 Singaporeans informed the Elections Department Singapore ("ELD", a department under the Prime Minister's Office) during the 2023 Presidential Election ("PE") that their names were not in the register of electors, even though they had last voted in the 2020 General Election ("GE").[1]

In its earlier press release on 24 August 2023, ELD had stated that 200 Singaporeans had informed ELD that they had been wrongly struck off from the register of electors following the issuance of the Writ of Election on 11 August 2023.

Mr Chan Chun Sing, Minister-in-charge of the Public Service, said in Parliament on 19 September, “For context, this number [1,093] averages one voter per polling station which had on average 2,400 registered voters in GE2020."

Mr Chan misses the point: one citizen wrongly omitted from the register of electors is one too many.

Mr Chan added, "I just want to assure the public that ELD has gone through the records, and while there is a margin of error, [it] is nowhere to the extent that you will call into question any of the election results that we have in recent memory.”[2]

Mr Chan misses the point again. Presidential and parliamentary elections are compulsory in Singapore. When ELD omits an elector from the register of electors, it deprives that citizen from exercising his or her democratic right to vote regardless of whether that one vote makes any difference in the result. Otherwise, a citizen who didn't vote in an election won't have to pay a fee to reinstate himself or herself in the register of electors.

Notes

1. Under the law, a citizen's name is removed from the register of electors if he or she fails to cast his or her vote in the last presidential or parliamentary election.

2. The point in this paragraph was not in ELD's Oral Reply to Parliamentary Questions on the Removal of Names from the Registers of Electors Eligible to Vote at Presidential Election 2023 and Technical Issues with Electronic Voter Registration System during Presidential Election 2023 (19 September 2023). It was reported, however, in Over 1,000 voters wrongly taken off voter rolls in PE 2023, due to human errors in GE 2020 (TODAY, 19 September 2023).