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).

Meritocracy?

In his speech at the farewell ceremony for President Halimah Yacob on 13 September 2023 at the Istana, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said that she showed that Singapore's meritocratic system worked in that every Singaporean could achieve his or her aspirations, regardless of race, language, or religion, and regardless of family background or station in life.

Regardless of race?

The 2016 Presidential election was reserved for Malays; no person of any other race could participate.

Regardless of station in life?

Clause 19 of the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore states that no person shall be elected as President unless he or she is qualified for election in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution.

Mr George Goh Ching Wah was ruled ineligible to contest the 2023 election.

Mr Mohamed Salleh Marican and Mr Farid Khan were ruled ineligible to contest the 2017 election.

Uncounted Babies and Total Fertility Rate's Incomplete Picture of Procreation Statistics

Singapore is a rather unique country in many ways.

One unique aspect is the significant levels of cross-border population inflow.  It grants of tens of thousands of permanent residency a year.  Significant numbers of residents marry non-residents.

In the light of these, does the total fertility rate truly reflect the country's fertility rate?

Total Fertility Rate Defined

Total fertility rate is defined as the average number of live births each woman would have during her reproductive years if she were to experience the age-specific fertility rates prevailing during the period.[1]  It is expressed as number of children per woman.

TFR takes the number of children born to women in a given year to represent the number of children they will give birth to by the end of their reproductive years.[2]

Labour Shortage in Singapore

The media reported that coffee and kaya toast chain Ya Kun was trying for four months to recruit eight waiters and cleaners for an outlet it wanted to open at Singapore Flyer, but without any success.  As a result, it was unable to commence operations there.

Driven by Singapore’s rapid and robust economic recovery, job vacancies rose to 50,200 in September 2010 from 45,100 in June 2010 and 36,900 in September 2009.  (The seasonally adjusted vacancies in September 2010 were 44,600, down from 45,400 in June 2010.)  43,400 of the vacancies in September 2010 were from the private sector, while the remaining 6,800 were from the public sector.  Job vacancies were 2.8 per cent of total manpower demand in September 2010.

The highest number of vacancies was for service and sales workers (10,330), professionals (8,270) and associate professionals and technicians (8,230).

In terms of the three broad occupational groupings, employers were most looking to hire professionals, managers, executives and technicians (44 per cent), clerical, service and sales workers (29 per cent) and production and transport operators, cleaners and labourers (27 per cent).

Companies such as Ya Kun which cannot find enough workers should firstly ask themselves whether they are paying enough and whether working conditions are good enough.

For too long, Singapore has relied on importing hordes of cheap (relative to Singapore wages) foreign workers to fill the ranks of its labour force.  But, it cannot continue.

Labour, just like capital and facilities, is a factor of production.  Companies that cannot obtain enough new capital to grow have to generate capital internally or grow more slowly or not at all.  Companies that want land or premises for their buildings must compete with other companies to bid for them.  There is no reason why labour should be an unlimited, or an almost unlimited, resource.  If a company cannot raise its wages or make working conditions more appealing or do whatever is required to secure the employees that it needs, the choices that it faces are clear — do something else or slow down, shut down or move out.

No businessman blames the government or anyone else if he cannot obtain funding or land or premises for his operations.  There is no reason to blame the government or anyone else if he cannot recruit enough employees.

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Notes

1.  "Job Vacancies Soar to Record Levels", The Straits Times, 29 January 2011.

2.  "Job Vacancies 2010", Ministry of Manpower.