I mentioned earlier that it was the PAP’s strategy to lose many votes in order to secure the country’s future. This, they have managed to do – although the opposition was unable to claim as many seats as could have been possible. Currently the PAP holds 93.1% of the seats in Parliament. It is important for the PAP to have some opposition MP’s in Parliament – not just as a checking mechanism, but also as a competitor of sorts, so that the public can compare and agree that only the PAP can do it’s job well. Sure, opposition representives criticize, but when they make mistakes, it is more difficult to cover them up – therefore the opposition can be controlled too. Anyway, it is important for a one-party leadership, such as in Singapore, to focus on it’s key strength: decision making. Therefore, as long as PAP holds the majority of the seats, this strength is not diminished. The opposition voice desired by the population must be there, but it must not be too great. Perhaps between 10% to 25% would be ideal.
The idea that the PAP wanted to give some ground to the opposition during this election is supported by several avoidable mistakes made recently.
We have heard (and seen) some of the MP Tin Pei Lin’s politically-wrong moments. This has dented Goh Chok Tong’s reputation somewhat, especially when he called voters’ complaints ‘noise’ (though to be fair, much of the online hate-speech were made by anonymous trolls). Alhough she is probably a capable lady off the camera, she is a negative example on media. This means that Singaporeans, in order to compare, have been nudged to see positive examples.
Former Minister Mentor Lee released a new book ‘Hard Truths to keep Singapore going’ several months before the General Election. In this book, he lamented that the Malays were not well integrated into Singaporean society. This, of course, provoked a response because it implied that the Malays were not trying to fit in. From this, MM Lee may have the intention of stumbling the Malay voters, making them rethink why they would vote the PAP. This is ideal (although at his expense), because blind voters could very well vote in an incompetent government, and lead to the fall of Singapore.
At another time, Lee also warned voters in Aljunied that they would have to ‘repent’ if the PAP did not win. It is quite a strong word, and apparently has been successful in creating both outrage and reflection amongst citizens. Anger may or may not last long, but at least Singaporeans have been caused to think of politics as a serious matter which can affect their livelihoods.
In conclusion, the PAP probably knows the limits to it’s power, and is trying to hand over some decision making to citizenry. In this way the country can really belong to it’s people. However, the first step would be to ‘awake’ the population from political slumber/apathy, no matter who is the leading party. Has this been successful? Only time will tell.
