In GE2020, I had to make a difficult choice at the ballot box: the People’s Action Party or Raeesah Khan.
But there was no choice at all.
Raeesah Khan would get caught lying in Parliament and be forced out of politics, the PAP would go on to implement vaccine discrimination measures, and the Workers’ Party would throw themselves behind the PAP’s policies. In the end, it didn’t matter who I voted for.
Likewise, for many Singaporeans in the coming General Elections, their vote won’t matter.
The Gravest Hour
The Covid period was the gravest hour in the life of Singapore. It was the period in which Singapore tethered on the brink of naked tyranny—a tyranny imposed in the name of ‘safety’.
Either you get the Covid vaccine—a ‘vaccine’ that does not actually prevent you from contracting a disease with a survival rate of over 98%—or you lose your job, get kicked out of school, and be banned from public spaces.
Either you follow the ever-changing Covid guidelines—guidelines which Sweden, the country swiftest to recover from the pandemic in Europe, were quick to abandon—or you face the full weight of the law.
Either you wholeheartedly support behind the Covid narrative—a narrative that consistently painted the unvaccinated as superspreaders and conspiracy theorists—or you are ostracized.
As the government passed regulation after regulation, tightening their grip on the daily lives of the people, what did the opposition do?
Most of them said nothing.
In the last election, Jamus Lim of the Workers’ Party said the party wanted to ‘deny the government a blank cheque’.
The government demanded multiple blank cheques, and every single time, Jamus Lim and the rest of the Workers’ Party stood back and let them write them.
And the rest of the Opposition?
Save for a few politicians—Goh Meng Seng, Lim Tean and Leong Mun Wai for example—they were silent.
In silence they signalled their surrender. Or even their agreement.
What is the purpose of an Opposition that will not oppose government overreach?
What is the difference between the Opposition and the government?
Beyond the Narrative
The dominant Singaporean political narrative is simple: monolithic PAP vs plucky underdog Opposition. PAP means more of the same, Opposition means change. Simple.
Simplistic.
For those who truly care about the direction of the country, this narrative is not enough. As Singapore was founded upon pragmatism, so we, too, must be pragmatic. Look past the party colours, and look into their policies. Tune out the motherhood statements, and tune in to what the candidates say about what they believe in. Think lightly about the pending hustings, and think deeply about the next ten, fifteen, and twenty years.
Where do you see both sides taking Singapore?
The paths they propose may branch away from each other—but many of them lead in the same direction.
The Illusion of Left and Right
Singaporean bloggers and activists like to paint the PAP as the ‘right’ and the Opposition as the ‘left’. This demarcation is based on the European model of politics, hearkening to the French Revolution.
Those who defended the Ancien Regime sat to the right of the President of the National Assembly, while those who supported the Revolution sat on the left. In time, conservatives were labelled right-wingers, while progressives became left-wingers.
But what are they progressing towards?
Progress is a nebulous word. Everyone wants to feel that they are progressing towards something. But modern progressives won’t define the goal they are progressing towards. All they have is the feeling of ‘progress’. This allows them to declare any goal they want ‘progress’
But as Soviet Russia, Communist China, and North Korea will tell you, progress towards the gulags and the graveyards is not progress at all.
Fundamentally, progressives believe in the malleability of Man. Man is a fallen animal, but through the guidance and intervention of his betters, he can become perfect. Only a higher being can accomplish this feat. Having renounced religion, progressives elevate the state to the level of divinity.
The State is omnipresent, omnibenevolent, omnipowerful. The State is perfect. The State is the highest ideal, and it is the solemn duty of the State to elevate all Man. Through education, all-encompassing policies, and the monopoly on violence, the State moulds Man into an image of itself.
Singapore, does this sound familiar to you?
Conservatives, in contrast, believe in the immutability of Man. Man remains Man no matter what the State says he is. Man is flawed and fallen, and will always remain so. The State, being made up of men, is also flawed. A flawed State will not use power wisely all the time, or even to the benefit of the people. Therefore, the State cannot be trusted with unlimited power.
Singapore operates under the model of maximum government. The hand of the State is everywhere. Look around you and you will see it.
Over 80% of the people live in HDB flats—and the Housing and Development Board is a government statutory board.
People shop at NTUC Fairprice, are insured under Income Insurance, eat out at Kopitiam and Foodfare, are members of NTUC—and the National Trades and Unions Congress is the sole trade union federation in Singapore, which works hand-in-hand with the government under Singapore’s labour tripartite model.
The People’s Association, which governs grassroots organisations, blurs the line between the government and the PAP, with the Prime Minister of Singapore currently serving as the Chairman, and many grassroots leaders and advisors becoming PAP candidates.
The government imposes racial housing quotas, uses National Service to bring together men of different races and religions, employs the bilingual language policy to create unified ethnic identities at the expense of minority languages and dialects, constantly engages in public education campaigns, and hammers anyone who tiptoes past the Out of Bounds markers.
Does this look ‘conservative’ to you?
Many Opposition-aligned Singaporeans think so. So to oppose the government, they call themselves left-wingers and progressives, drawing inspiration from Western leftists.
Which means they become even more progressive than an already progressive government.
Between Left and Far Left
In many constituencies, the choice is not between the PAP and the Opposition. It is between the left and far left.
And the far left always drags the left with them.
Consider Section 377A. In my lifetime, I have seen the government move from proposing a spirited defence of the law in Parliament to abolishing it. This decriminalisation of homosexuality aligns with progressive political trends worldwide. The government’s silence on drag queens performing in front of children in Singapore also aligns with progressive political trends worldwide.
Consider also Palestine. The war in the Middle East holds no strategic import to Singapore. Tragedy it may be, but it has little bearing on Singapore’s interests. However, many Singaporean Muslims sympathise with Palestine, and so does the Singapore left. Recently, Singapore has gone from supporting both the two-state solution and Israel to openly criticising Israel and aiding the Palestinian Authority. This extends to repeating Hamas propaganda about civilian casualties, even after Hamas quietly removed thousands of names from the death lists, which now show that 72% of Gazan dead are military-aged males—the same demographic as Hamas fighters. The Singapore government’s position now mirrors the more moderate of the Singapore leftists.
The Opposition like to claim that the PAP adopted policies that they previously proposed. This proves my point. The PAP would not have done so unless these policies were broadly aligned with their overall political ideology—or else have marched leftwards along with the Opposition.
The Opposition and the PAP are directionally aligned. They may disagree on certain points of policy. However, they agree with the fundamental idea of the mutability of Man and the divinity of the State.
Don’t believe me? Read through the Opposition manifestoes. How many call for rolling back state power? How many want to shrink the size and scale of the state? How many want reduced government involvement in everyday life?
How many want even greater government involvement in everyday life?
Yes, there are Opposition-aligned figures who did call for the reduction of government powers. Activists and politicians did criticise the Prevention of Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act when it was passed. But how did they react when the government exercised POFMA?
When the government POFMA’d those aligned with them—the Singapore Anti-Death Penalty Campaign for example—they kicked up a storm.
When the government POFMA’d those not aligned with them, they were silent.
If they were opposed to POFMA in principle, they would have spoken up whenever it was exercised. They would have done their homework and stood for the truth, no matter how unpopular it might have been. Instead, they followed the time-tested progressive principle of helping their allies and hurting their enemies.
In this same vein, these people do not believe in principle, but power. They oppose government power when it is applied against them and their allies; they support it when it is applied against their enemies.
They are not opposed to government power. They simply want to leverage it for their ends.
The greatest crisis Singapore has faced came from State power. None of them opposed these measures. Some even welcomed them. And they didn’t go out of their way to check the government’s claims.
What is the difference between the State and the progressives? The latter is further left than the former.
When the boot is on your throat, does it matter if it is a left boot or another left boot?
The Illusion of Choice
The colour of the candidate’s shirt doesn’t matter. The name of the party doesn’t matter. What matters is policy. On the most important policy of all, whether the people answer to the government or the government answers to the people, there is no difference between the PAP and many Opposition figures.
They are all in lockstep.
This is not to disparage the work of Goh Meng Seng and others mentioned above. But there are too few politicians like them in Singapore. Even if they were all elected to Parliament, they are too few to significantly influence the political process. They are the fringe of the Opposition, not the majority.
The parties they lead may unveil new candidates soon. But unless I have seen them discuss politics previously—and I do know Marcus Neo of Red Dot United has opposed vaccine discrimination—I cannot vouch for them.
GE2025 may be a watershed moment in Singapore politics. It is the first electoral test of Prime Minister Lawrence Wong since he took office. Yet, on matters most important to me, the only choice being offered to most Singaporeans is the choice between the PAP of today and the PAP 10 years from today.
It is still the same PAP that will clamp down on dissent, the same PAP that will impose draconian measures in the name of ‘safety’, the same PAP that acts with the Mandate of Heaven.
And the Opposition will not oppose that.
The Longest Game
This essay is not to discourage you from voting. Vote for whomever you believe in. But understand that Singapore’s future is not decided by a single election. It is decided over the course of decades and generations.
Politics is downstream from culture. Right now, we have a culture that supports maximum government. So long as this culture remains, the sword of the State will always hang over everyone’s heads.
If you wish to step out from under the sword, then you must change the culture.
The government is not God. Not just the PAP, but the very apparatus of State. The government is composed of mortal men with mortal failings. Being made up of imperfect men, the government cannot be trusted with unlimited power. Government should only have enough power to carry out its duties—and not one iota more.
In the absence of the guiding hand of a God-government, you must cultivate yourself. This means developing courage, honour, integrity, and all the great virtues. If you wish to be free, you must earn the right to be free. Freedom goes only to those who can govern themselves, because they do not need a government to tell them how they must behave. You must transform yourself into a human who is not dependent on the government, because only then will they have no influence over you.
And you must pass on these ideas to your children, your grandchildren, and your great-grandchildren.
Culture comes from the values lived by the people, and from culture comes the politics that reflect these values. This was how the Abolitionists ended slavery after centuries of struggle, this was how the Progressives took power in the modern era: by changing the culture of their countries, over years and decades and centuries.
This may be daunting, but take heart: modern-day Progressives don’t prioritise having children. They don’t even think beyond the next American electoral cycle.
If you want to see _real _change in Singapore, you have to play the long game. Start with yourself, then those in your circles of influence, and then beyond. Think about the society you want to live in ten, fifteen and twenty years from now. Then work at it.
Change won’t come from the Opposition.
It comes from you.
You want to change the culture, start by backing those trying to build a better world.