Workers' Party of Singapore

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The Workers' Party of Singapore is one of the largest opposition parties in Singapore, with 1 of the 84 elected seats in the Parliament of Singapore currently.

It was founded before independence, in 1957, by the former and first Chief Minister of Singapore and former Labour Front leader David Saul Marshall and has opposed the People's Action Party (PAP) ever since. It is a party based on social democracy and is considered left of centre. Its only MP at the moment is Low Thia Khiang, who is member for Hougang and also the current secretary-general(leader) of the party. It had 4 MPs from 1957 to 1958. After that it soon went into obscurity until 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. The victor was the then party leader J.B. Jeyaretnam, who kept his and the party's only seat in the general elections of 1984 and then 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.

Before the 1988 General Elections, the Barisan Sosialis Party and the Singapore United Front were absorbed into the Worker's Party. 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 Eunos GRC (Group Representation Constituency), which contained 3 seats. One of the losing candidates was the noted former head of the bar society, Francis Seow, who later fled to the U.S and was accused by the government for working for the CIA. As a result,under a new scheme - the Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) for the best losing opposition candidate and provided that opposition parties failed to win 3 seats or more , Lee Siew Choh took up this seat for the Worker's Party. Although the NCMP 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. Jufrie denied that he was one. 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 thanks to 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 attracted unwelcome 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 later in an interview 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 were allegations that the then Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and his wife took discounts while purchasing an apartment in the mid-1990s. 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.The PAP insisted as this issue had been discussed in parliament(in the presence of 4 opposition members) and it had been confirmed that it was common practice to take discounts while purchasing an apartment, thus clearing Lee Kuan Yew of any wrongdoing, Tang was obviously 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.

Once again the Worker's Party 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 loser. This would be first time since 1986 that the former Worker's Party leader would return to parliament. 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 look upon him as an elder and had done everything possible to help him.

Observers claimed with Low at the helm, the party would tone down its more hardline 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.

The members of the Worker's Party now wear blue shirts and black trousers or skirts.

The most seats it has had in recent times was 2, from 1997 to 2001, when J. B. Jeyaretnam was a NCMP.

External link

• Official website (http://www.wp.org.sg/)