In Singapore, whenever an election looms, talk is never about whether the ruling party will lose power. Rather, attention centres on how much or little support the opposition can prise from the People’s Action Party’s (PAP) firm grasp to advance its chances.
With the new electoral boundaries published this week ahead of what pundits have predicted will be a May election, all sides are deciding whom to field where. But for the opposition parties, it is a more fraught task as constituencies they had long been eyeing and tilling for votes have been redrawn, and they lack the formidable party machinery of the PAP to redirect resources in double quick time.
After 66 years in power, the PAP is one of the longest-ruling parties among modern parliamentary democracies. If it wins the coming 14th general election, it is on track to become the longest governing party in history. Only Mexico’s Institutional Revolutionary Party, which led the country for 71 years, lasted longer.
The PAP’s threshold of never winning less than 60 per cent of the popular vote would be the envy of any other political party. But in Singapore, a strong mandate has long been framed as critical for long-term planning and policy implementation.
Even Prime Minister Lawrence Wong has acknowledged that there is a greater desire for opposition voices in the city state, however.
“For now, most Singaporeans want the PAP to form the government. And we are grateful for their support and for the mandate they have given us,” he told members at the party’s 70th anniversary celebrations in November.
“But, at the same time, we know they want more opposition voices in parliament. At least there is a segment of Singaporeans who say, ‘We want PAP to serve us as government, but we also want more opposition voices in parliament’.”
In the last election in 2020, the main opposition Workers’ Party (WP) won its second multi-seat constituency – long considered impenetrable PAP fortresses – in newly formed Sengkang. This victory resulted in a record 10 out of 93 seats in parliament being held by the opposition.
With the Electoral Boundaries Review Committee having increased the number of parliamentary seats to 97 and redrawn districts, a key question is whether the WP can net another of these group representation constituencies (GRC), as they are called, to chip away at the PAP’s supermajority.
At a forum earlier this year, WP chief Pritam Singh said the party believed “at least one-third of the elected members of parliament must be opposition MPs”.
Having a third of MPs in the legislature would allow the opposition to block amendments to the constitution. Recent constitutional amendments that were passed in Singapore included the creation of the “reserved presidency” in 2017, which aims to ensure that ethnic minority candidates are represented, as well as provisions to legally protect the heterosexual definition of marriage.
Before January, Singh had described winning one-third of parliamentary seats as a “medium-term” goal for his party. Analysts noted the significance of his omission of a specific time frame from his latest comments. It remains to be seen whether the WP has the necessary depth in its ranks to contest a third of seats, which would be a first for the party.
Given Singapore’s first past-the-post electoral system, a reduced majority for the ruling party might not translate to fewer seats. For now, the best-case scenario for the opposition is winning more seats, while the worst outcome would be maintaining the status quo. But can they break through?
While much may be at stake for the opposition, the PAP is also under pressure to perform well in its first election under a new leader. Wong was chosen by his peers after an earlier successor to former prime minister Lee Hsien Loong stepped down unexpectedly. Ultimately, the vote will be seen as a referendum on his leadership
Domino plan halted?
From its perch in the single-seat constituency of Hougang, the WP made a historic breakthrough in the 2011 general election by winning neighbouring Aljunied GRC, ousting former foreign minister George Yeo and his team. It marked the first time since the formation of GRCs in 1988 that an opposition party had succeeded in winning such a constituency.
Two elections later, the WP went on to win another neighbouring GRC, Sengkang, and ran tight races in two other nearby GRCs: East Coast and Marine Parade. In recent years, the party has remained active in the east and northeast regions, seeking to employ what analysts have called a “domino” strategy to capture adjoining seats one by one.
Nearly all GRCs underwent boundary changes in the Electoral Boundaries Review Committee report that was released on Tuesday. This committee, appointed by the prime minister and comprising senior civil servants, takes into account population shifts and new housing developments.
In East Coast GRC, the committee noted a 25 per cent increase in electors, to 150,691 from 120,239 in 2020, marking the most substantial growth in size among the 18 GRCs.Wong, when announcing the committee’s formation, said that its brief was to “keep the average size of GRCs” – as well as the proportion of MPs elected from single-member constituencies and the average ratio of electors to elected MPs – “all at about the same” as in the last general election.
Eugene Tan, a law don at Singapore Management University, noted that the committee specified a ratio of about 28,000 electors per MP, and East Coast GRC remained within this guideline, consistent with Wong’s instructions.
In the last general election, the average ratio was about 29,200 electors per MP, which he said indicated that the overall ratio had remained largely unchanged.
While this consistency is notable, a one-fourth increase makes East Coast GRC larger than any constituency the WP has had a reasonable chance of winning in the past. The party has typically targeted medium-sized GRCs, with the logic being that the larger the constituency, the harder it becomes to reach voters, resulting in a greater focus on national issues and fewer local grievances for the opposition to exploit.