Singapore’s ruling party takes punt on early poll

Undefeated since 1965, Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party faces elections on July 10 with a strong hand. But grumblings over the government’s handling of the pandemic could yet spur the opposition to score a few upsets

It is almost election time in Singapore, and in a citystate about one-third the size of Luxembourg, it is almost inevitable that candidates’ paths will cross on the campaign trail. So it was on July 2 for Darryl David of Singapore’s ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) and opposition candidate Andy Zhu.

Swapping campaign leaflets as their encounter was caught on camera by local television, they could be heard saying: “I take yours, you take mine.” David and Zhu are two of the 191 candidates representing 11 political parties fighting it out over nine days of campaigning ahead of a snap parliamentary vote set for July 10.

The election comes a little over a month after the end of a coronavirus lockdown dubbed a “circuit breaker” by the PAP government.

The vote looks unlikely to break the circuit of PAP’s six decades of electoral success, despite disaffection from none other than Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s own brother. Although he is supporting the new Progress Singapore Party (PSP) in the upcoming vote, sibling Lee Hsien Yang will not run for a seat – as “Singapore does not need another Lee.” All the same, Lee Hsien Yang has called for change, saying the PAP “has lost its way.”

The PAP juggernaut has romped to victory in every vote since independence in 1965. It also won those held in the citystate before then, including during the brief and loveless marriage with neighbouring Malaysia in the 1960s.

There the ruling National Front coalition enjoyed a similarly unblemished electoral record until Mahathir Mohamed, its longest-serving premier, defected to the opposition to drive a historic 2018 electoral upset.

But there seems little chance of a reprise in Singapore, which despite a shared history and land border with Malaysia, eschews the fractiousness and intrigue of politics north of the Strait of Johor.

In Singapore’s most recent national elections in 2015, the PAP cruised to a twelfth successive post-independence triumph, sweeping up 69.9% of the vote in a typically facile contest.

This year’s election was called nine months ahead of schedule, with the PAP government hedging its bets on the future course of the coronavirus pandemic ahead of the April 2021 voting deadline. However the PAP’s pandemic track record could yet undermine its apparent invincibility.

Until the end of March, Singapore was widely lauded for having relatively few cases, despite being one of the first countries outside China to be affected.

But then the caseload spiked, climbing from 1,000 on April 1 to just under 45,000 on July 2. As cases surged, the government imposed its “circuit breaker” on April 7.

Lasting almost two months, the lockdown sharpened the economic pain inflicted on the trade and investment-dependent city-state by lockdowns elsewhere.

Almost all of Singapore’s cases have been among male migrant workers, who are typically housed in close quarters in residences and dormitories.

Most Singaporeans have been unaffected, prompting National Development Minister and PAP heavyweight Lawrence Wong to describe the virus as “under control,” despite the country reporting 188 new cases on July 2.

But Tan Cheng Bock, 80, a former PAP stalwart who heads the Progress Singapore Party, was unconvinced.

The PAP’s “boasting in January,” Tan said on July 2, “failed to prepare Singapore for the explosion of dormitory cases in April.” Tan and the rest of Singapore’s opposition are hoping to at least reduce the PAP’s huge majority and curb its legislative freedom.

The ruling party leaders “do not have all the answers,” Tan said.