Workers' Party of Singapore
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The Workers' Party of Singapore (abbrev: WP; Chinese: 新加坡工人党) is one of the largest opposition parties in Singapore, with 1 of the 84 elected seats in the current session of Parliament of Singapore. Low Thia Khiang, its Secretary-General holds the single seat for the electoral division of Hougang. The incumbent chairman is Sylvia Lim, who is also the current Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP). Together, the party holds 2 parliament seats, which was also achieved by from 1997 to 2001, when J. B. Jeyaretnam was a Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) together with Low Thia Khiang also holding the single seat of Hougang.
Contents |
[edit] Executive Council
- Sylvia Lim, Chairman
- Mohammed Rahizan bin Yaacob, Vice Chairman
- Low Thia Khiang, Secretary General
- Eric Tan Heng Chong, Treasurer
- Ng Swee Bee, Deputy Treasurer
- Yaw Shin Leong, Organising Secretary
- Perry Tong Tzee Kwang, President, WP Youth Wing
- Brandon Siow Wei Min, Webmaster
- Glenda Han Su May, Deputy Webmaster
- Dr Poh Lee Guan, Council Member
- Jane Leong, Council Member
- Lee Wai Leng, Council Member
- Abdul Salim bin Harun, Council Member
[edit] History
In 1957, after the first Chief Minister of Singapore and Labour Front leader David Saul Marshall resigned from all administrational duties due to the failed Merdeka Talks to seek self-governance for Singapore, Marshall continued in the pre-independence arena of Singapore politics by founding the Worker’s Party of Singapore. The WP has opposed the People's Action Party (PAP) ever since. Based on social democracy, WP is considered left of centre. Its only MP at the moment is Low Thia Khiang, MP for Hougang SMC and also the current secretary-general (leader) of the party.
WP had 4 MPs from 1957 to 1958 during the pre-independence period in the parliament. Obscurity succeeded the party after which, until it was being revived by a group of lawyers led by J.B. Jeyaretnam in 1972. In 1981 the party was the first opposition party since Singapore's independence to win a seat through a by-election victory at Anson, by the then party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam, who kept his and the party's only seat in the general elections of 1984 and at last lost his seat after a financial conviction in 1986. In 1987, several of its party members were accused by the government of being Communists and were briefly detained by the Internal Security Department. They were released on condition that they would not enter politics again.
Prior to the 1988 General Elections, the Barisan Sosialis Party and the Singapore United Front were absorbed into WP. As a result, Lee Siew Choh, the former head of the Barisan Sosialis Party, became a candidate for the Worker's Party.
In the 1988 General Elections, the Worker's Party failed to win a seat but came close to winning the 3 seats in the Eunos GRC (Group Representation Constituency). One of the WP candidates, was the distinguished former head of the bar society, Francis Seow, who later fled to the United States after being accused by the government for espionage, coinciding with the inauguration of the new scheme to allow opposition candidates to fill in the parliament as Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP). Francis Seow, being the best losing opposition candidate and provided that opposition parties failed to win 3 seats or more, Lee Siew Choh took up the NCMP seat for the Worker's Party instead. Although NCMPs could not vote in parliament, Lee still took up several issues, including the Internal Security Act, living costs and welfare.
In the 1991 general elections, the PAP accused one of the party's candidates for the Eunos GRC, Mohhamed Jufrie, as a Malay chauvinist, an accusation Jufrie profusely denied. The issue soon died down after the end of the elections as it was believed that the Singapore government did not want to be perceived by their Malaysian counterparts as bullying the Malays, who are a minority race in Singapore. Nonetheless, this did not affect the party's performance as it finally won a seat in Hougang by Low Thia Khiang, then the party's vice-secretary general. Together with 3 seats from the Singapore Democratic Party, the opposition won 4 out of 81 seats. Low Thia Khiang captured national attention for his performances in the legislature in which he received praise and admiration for his assertiveness, good analytical abilities and his willingness to be constructive rather than oppose for the sake of opposing. In 1996, Lee Siew Choh left the party, citing irreconcilable differences with the party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam.
In the 1997 General Elections, the party was plagued with unsolicited attention when one of its candidates Tang Liang Hong, a lawyer, was accused of being an anti-Christian and anti-Muslim Chinese chauvinist by the ruling PAP. Tang, who insisted all “he was trying to do is to better represent the Chinese community and ask questions on their behalf”, has vigorously denied this charge and accused the PAP of trying to win votes by sowing fear on the electorate. Tang, who contested in the 5 seat Cheng San GRC alongside party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam, also attacked the PAP on the issue of the HPL case. The HPL case started when the Stock Exchange of Singapore criticized Hotel Properties Ltd (HPL) for its "tardiness" in disclosing details of sales of its condominium units to directors and their family members.[1] Because Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and his wife took discounts while purchasing an apartment in 1996 and Lee Suan Yew, Lee's younger brother, was on the board of directors of the company, this raised suspicions. Tang had made these allegations in a Chinese magazine 'Yazhou Zhoukan', which later lost in a libel suit filed by Lee Kuan Yew and was ordered to pay damages. Deputy Prime Minister Tony Tan, former Cabinet Minister S. Dhanabalan and Heng Chiang Meng, who is President of the Real Estate Developer's Association (Redas), told the House that it was normal practice for developers to cite high list prices and offer customers varying discounts.[2] Lee Kuan Yew claimed that Tang was trying to milk this issue for political capital and promptly sued him for defamation. Tang was also sued for branding the PAP leadership as a bunch of liars. He was eventually sued by the whole PAP leadership for a total of S$13.6 million and fled to Australia soon after the elections.
WP managed to hold the one seat it had won in the previous elections. As the opposition managed to win only 2 seats in the election, one NCMP seat was available and it went to J.B. Jeyaretnam, the best opposition designate, returning to parliament for the first time since 1986. In 2001, Jeyaretnam lost his NCMP seat when he failed to pay damages owing to a libel suit in which he was sued for calling Indian PAP leaders as a bunch of stooges to the ruling PAP in a 1996 issue of the party newspaper 'The Hammer'. In the same year, Jeyaratnam resigned the party leadership and Low Thia Khiang succeeded him. The transfer of this post took place in bitter acrimony as Jeyaretnam later accused Low of not doing enough to help him pay the damages. In response, Low has always claimed he had always looked upon him as an elder and had done everything possible to help him.
The members of the Worker's Party now wear blue shirts and black trousers or skirts to show its links with the blue collar workers.
[edit] 2001 elections
Observers claimed with Low at the helm, the party would tone down its more hard-line stance and go for a more centrist outlook for the 2001 elections. Indeed as soon as Low took over, while a faction supporting Jeyaretnam left the party, a group of younger and more educated persons were recruited into the organisation. Among them were James Gomez and Yaw Shin Leong. During the elections, due to technical mistakes, the party failed to contest the 5 seat Aljunied GRC. Nonetheless, the party managed to do well to defend its only seat at Hougang, won by Low. In 2002, the party managed to recruit Sylvia Lim, a law lecturer and celebrated its 45th anniversary, though without the presence of former party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam.
[edit] 2006 elections
The Workers' Party (WP) launched an updated manifesto on January 14, 2006. The 52-page booklet outlined the party's stand on issues and policies, covering areas from economic and judicial policies to media and sports and recreation [1]. The manifesto, which had last been updated in 1994, took one year to work on according to party leader Low Thia Khiang. The manifesto was attacked by the ruling PAP for containing "time-bombs". CNA In response, the Workers' Party quipped that its manifesto contained time bombs which threatened the PAP's power.
The party contested three Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs) and 4 Single Member Constituencies (SMCs) in the 2006 general election. The 3 GRCs were Ang Mo Kio, Aljunied, and East Coast, and the 4 SMCs were Nee Soon East, Nee Soon Central, Joo Chiat, and Hougang. Although its only victory was the retention of Hougang by Low Thia Khiang, the party made an overall gain in share of votes. In particular, it won 43.92% of votes in Aljunied, which gave it the right to the Non-Constituency MP seat reserved for the best-performing opposition loser.
The WP also sent a team of 6 to challenge the stronghold of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at Ang Mo Kio GRC. Most of the team members were their 20s and the constituency was contested for the first time in 15 years. Its decision to contest Ang Mo Kio came as a surprise, as the opposition was expected to stay away from GRCs helmed by heavyweight ministers; but the party said that giving Ang Mo Kio residents a chance to vote was a prime reason for contesting the GRC [2]. Given the inexperience of the WP team and Lee Hsien Loong's position as the Prime Minister, they won a surprisingly strong 33.87% of the vote. The Workers' Party's performance at the election established them as the strongest of the opposition parties.
During the campaign, controversy erupted over candidate James Gomez who claimed that the Elections Department had lost a form for his minority certificate, and was forced to apologise when video camera evidence showed that he had placed the form in his briefcase without submitting it. The PAP attacked Gomez for the incident, with Lee Kuan Yew publicly calling Gomez a "liar" and inviting the Workers' Party to prove him wrong by suing him for defamation. One day after the election, Gomez, who was travelling to Stockholm to resume work, was prevented from leaving Singapore, had his passport confiscated and arrested with criminal intimidation in connection with the incident. A few days after intense questioning, he was released by the Police after a warning and was allowed to return to Stockholm.
[edit] Party manifesto 2006
In preparation for the 2006 elections, the Workers' Party released its manifesto on 14 January 2006. [3] The manifesto presents a detailed description of the party's ideas, beliefs, and specific proposals under various topics including government, education and healthcare. The following lists but a few of the proposals in the manifesto.
- Government & civil liberties
- The Office of Elected President should be abolished and the Presidency should be reverted to its former ceremonial position.
- Parliamentary elections should be organized by an independent election commission, not by the Prime Minister's Office.
- Electoral boundary changes should be announced at least one year before a general election is called.
- Group Representation Constituencies should be abolished.
- Internal Security Act should be abolished.
- Peaceful demonstrations should be allowed.
- Justice, law and order
- Mandatory sentences for offences should be removed
- A statutory criminal legal aid scheme should be set up.
- Innocent persons who have been mistakenly arrested and/or prosecuted should be compensated.
- Appellate court should not enhanced the sentence of an accused person making the appeal.
- Economic policy
- There should be a waiver of Goods and Services Tax on basic necessities, such as rice.
- Have a one-stop centre to better focus and promote the development of the SMEs.
- Society
- To abolish the government grassroots organisations: Resident Committees and Citizens Consultative Committee.
- Propose a Social Cohesion Public Holiday to mark the successful integration of Singapore as a multi-racial and multi-religious society.
- To set up Unemployment insurance system so as to provide a better social safety net.
- Citizens who are in dire straits should be allowed to withdraw from their own CPF to avoid abuse, withdrawals must fulfill strict guidelines and the amount withdrawn will not be entided to the 2.5% nominal interest.
- Health Care
- To set up national health insurance scheme.
- Medisave should be allowed, with a cap on its usage, for specialist outpatient or major medical treatments not classified as Basic Hospitalisation Healthcare.
- Education
- Replacement Of The Streaming System With A Multi-tiered Advancement System.
- Co-payment by university students should be pegged at 10% of operating expenditure of local tertiary institutions.
- Any tuition fee increases for tertiary institutions should be subject to scrutiny by an independent watchdog that will ensure that increases are minimal and justifiable. It is imprudent to fix a quantum for permitted tuition fee increases per year.
- Public Housing
- Ethnic quotas governing home ownership of HDB flats should be removed.
- All citizens should be able to apply directly to HDB for flats twice. The lessee has to live in both flats for 5 years each before he is allowed to sell it on the open market.
- Public Transport
- The Public Transport Council should be dissolved. All public transport including the MRT & public buses servicing major trunk/inter-town routes should be brought under a National Transport Corporation which will oversee and provide universal transport service to all.
- The National Transport Corporation should not be profit-oriented and should aim to provide public transportation service on the basis of cost and depreciation recovery.
- The National Transport Corporation should concentrate on providing trunk services.
- Inter-town feeder bus services should be de-regulated to allow individual private operators to operate as in the case of the mini-bus system in Hong Kong.
- Public buses should be exempted from unnecessary or additional taxes as the general public will eventually be made to bear this.
- Arts, media, information and new technology
- The Newspapers and Printing Presses Act should be amended to abolish clauses which give the government the right to appoint the management and boards of directors of media companies.
- Create competition by issuing licences to allow private and commercial media (in particular television and newspaper) with no government ownership to operate in Singapore.
- Independent and professional organisations should be established to monitor the media.
- The Films Act should be amended to liberalise the law on making "political" films, allowing groups and individuals to express their views by making such films.
- Constitutional provisions entrenching a right to privacy and legislation such as a Privacy Act should be enacted to ensure that ordinary citizens' rights to privacy are protected.
- We should create a Freedom of Information Act containing provisions to allow citizens to gather information from the State and to ensure that the government puts out suffIcient information.
- Population
- Medical assistance such as In-Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) for couples who want to have children but have diffIculty in conceiving should be made more affordable.
- All foreign spouses should be accorded residency status and allowed to work locally. This can be in the form of a new category of Residential Visa.
- Foreign work-permit holders who have worked locally for at least 5 years should be allowed to marry Singapore citizens without the need to seek approval from the Ministry of Manpower.
- Work permit holders who have left Singapore for 5 years should be allowed to marry Singaporeans without the need to seek approval from the Ministry of Manpower.
- Labour policy and CPF
- Instead of just negotiating on retrenchment benefits, trade unions should be allowed to discuss with the management the rationale for retrenchments.
- All government ministers and executive council members of political parties should not take office in trade unions at any level.
- The minimum wage in Collective Agreements should be strictly enforced. Union leaders should educate employees on their minimum wage and to make a report if they have been "short-changed".
- The long term total CPF contribution rate should be ftxed at 35% for employees age 55 and below: Both the employer and employee should contribute 17.5% each to the fund.
- The required number of years of continuous services for entitlement to retrenchment benefits should be reduced from three to two years.
- Mandatory retrenchment benefit should be increased from one to two weeks of the basic salary.
- The definition of employee under the Employment Act should be reviewed to allow employees who are in the managerial, executive or confidential positions to have certain protections under the Act.
- The amendments to the Employment Act allowing employers not to pay workers for overtime should be repealed.
[edit] References
- ^ Ven Sreenivasan and Michelle Low , "Analysts support SES censure of HPL," in: Business Times, April 24, 1996, p. 15
- ^ Warren Fernandez, "Full details of condo deals revealed," The Straits Times, May 22, 1996, p.1
