Straits Times: Yes, you do have a choice

LOOKING GOOD: Workers' Party candidates in East Coast GRC meeting People's Action Party supporters en route to the Nomination Centre at Bedok View Secondary School yesterday. This time round, the WP has some 'fairly presentable' candidates, to quote none other than MM Lee Kuan Yew. -- TERENCE TAN

WHEN the People's Action Party (PAP) swept a massive 75.3 per cent of the votes in the last general election, political watchers got worried. They feared that the 20-year high portended, as one pundit put it, "the beginning of the end" of opposition politics in Singapore.

Only 29 opposition members contested, and only two got into Parliament, both with narrow margins. Would the two - Mr Chiam See Tong, now 71, and Mr Low Thia Khiang, now 49 - be able to bring new blood into their respective parties? The prospects then seemed dim.

Five years later, the skies have cleared. The opposition has made an amazing recovery from 2001 and is fighting for 47 of the 84 seats in Parliament, the highest number since 1988. Voters, of course, would want all 84 seats contested. Still, technically there is no guarantee, at this point in time, that the PAP will form the next government.

But where in the past the PAP might have tried to instil fear into voters by warning of a "freak" result, both sides have matured this time round. When pressed for his stand on this issue yesterday, Mr Lee Hsien Loong said only that this would help focus voters' minds on the issue at hand, namely that they would now be voting for a government and not just for an MP. "We're going after every vote," he said.

But the opposition has minced no words on the possibility of a "freak" result. "Get real," Workers' Party (WP) chairman Sylvia Lim said. Singaporeans need not fear that a vote for the opposition will lead inadvertently to the PAP Government being thrown out. The odds of that happening were laughable, although theoretically possible.

So there is a new realism in the political landscape, reflective of an electorate that is also more mature.

A SECOND LOOK

THE more than 1.2 million voters who will have a choice come Polling Day on May 6 will probably not find it easy to decide. Unlike past elections, there are no more spoiler or loony candidates or candidates from obscure parties who are easy to rule out.

This time, all seem deserving of a second look. So how they sound; how they walk; how they shake hands; what they promise - all these will come into play in decision-making.

In Ang Mo Kio GRC, will it be Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong or hot babe Glenda Han, as some people at the Young PAP website have dubbed her? In Aljunied GRC, will it be the no less attractive Sylvia Lim or the redoubtable Foreign Minister George Yeo and his team?

The PAP's slate of candidates, as always, comprises people with impressive credentials. But this time round, the WP too has some "fairly presentable" candidates, to quote none other than Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew. Of its 20 candidates, 15 are graduates and 10 professionals. The Singapore Democratic Alliance has a more motley crew of 20 but even among them are at least six professionals.

More significantly, the WP is showing a commitment to thinking long-term. Party secretary-general Low Thia Khiang, who took over from Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam in 2001, says the party has been actively renewing itself by attracting new members. "Our renewal will continue until I'm renewed," he has declared.

Indeed, the party's declared long-term aim is to build itself up so it may eventually be able to contest more than half the seats. "Giving people a choice is in itself important," says chairman Ms Lim.

Then there are the respective party promises or platforms. For the PAP, candidates ride on the party's proven track record of bringing peace, prosperity and progress. They also ride on a manifesto that promises a more inclusive society where every Singaporean matters and where there are opportunities for all, young and old.

For those with children or who are concerned about the future, the PAP offers the surest bet because of its emphasis on policies that try to ensure Singapore's long-term survival.

MM Lee once put it this way when defending the Government's high level of reserves: "What is the deepest obligation of any government? It is not to the present, and certainly not the past, but to the future."

The opposition makes no such commitment, or at least not in the same way. The closest it gets to a counter to the PAP's long-term appeal is this: You need opposition voices in Parliament to act as a check on the PAP, and this too is for the long term. For how can we be sure the PAP will not degenerate from its high standards?

This will be a powerful argument among voters. It is not surprising that few opposition candidates, apart from the SDA teams in Tampines and Pasir Ris-Punggol GRCs, have ventured beyond rhetorical arguments to offer specifics on what they will do if elected.

Does the opposition's improved slate compared to recent elections signify more votes for the opposition come May 6? Most probably. Young, and not so young, professionals desire opposition voices in Parliament. That more professionals have joined the opposition fray this time may reflect just the tip of an undercurrent that is gaining strength.

The fact that not a few opposition candidates are entrepreneurs and businessmen by profession is not accidental: These are risk-takers who have known what it is like to lose and are not afraid to do so.

That five of the 47 opposition candidates are women is also a record, although as a ratio it is lower than the PAP's 17 out of 84.

What are the opposition's chances in this election?

No opposition man has made it on his first try. Mr Low made it on his second attempt when he was 35. Mr Chiam made it on his third when he was already 49. Mr Steve Chia, best-performing among losing candidates in 2001, joined battle in 1997 at the age of 26 and will contest his third election this round.

Issue-wise, the perennial one will be the cost of living and related economic concerns, which never fail to find traction among significant numbers of people. But with the opposition offering no solutions of its own, this on its own won't be enough to land a candidate in Parliament.

In Sembawang GRC, the Singapore Democratic Party promises to rake the ruling party over the coals by making an issue of how the Government handled or mishandled the National Kidney Foundation saga. But with the culprits - T.T. Durai and his merry men and women at the old NKF - already facing both criminal charges and civil suits, the wind has been taken out of the SDP's sails. Singaporeans can be quite forgiving of past lapses in oversight once they have had their pound of flesh from the individual culprits. No one is perfect, not even ministers.

More critically, the disarray in SDP ranks means voters will look askance at whatever its candidates there promise. Can they deliver if the party may not even be around next year or so, which could happen if its members lose the defamation case brought against some of them by PM Lee and MM Lee?

A DILEMMA

TO RETURN to the national level: Singaporeans do have a choice in this election.

But not to put too fine a point to it, the choice is between two horns of a dilemma.

For there is not just one set of choices, but two. One set of choices is between less or more opposition in Parliament. The other is between electing a team or candidate who is part of a party that will lead Singapore well, and one who is yet untried.

There's a clear trade-off between these two sets of choices.

Whichever choice they make, there's one thing voters can remain sanguine about: If the opposition can make such a miraculous turnaround from the last election, it's not likely to ever die out.

leehoong@sph.com.sg