Singapore’s prime minister yesterday lauded the city-state’s youth vote for helping return his party to power in a massive election victory and reversing a worrying drop in popularity it suffered in the previous polls four years ago.
The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) secured 83 of the 89 seats in the Singaporean Parliament, while the opposition Workers’ Party captured six in Friday’s elections.
“It is a good result for the PAP, but it is an excellent result for Singapore,” Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) said early yesterday, after final results were announced.
Photo: Reuters
He said the result would not have been possible without broad support from all sections of society.
“And in particular, it could not have been done without strong support from the young... It shows that the young people understand what is at stake, support what we are doing, really to secure a bright future for Singapore,” he said.
The PAP’s victory was never in doubt — it has won every election since independence in 1965 — but what was notable was the percentage of votes it secured: nearly 70 percent of all votes cast, compared with 60 percent in the 2011 elections.
A day after the election, candidates of various political parties were up early to thank residents through walkabouts and victory parades in open-top vehicles.
The huge sweep means the struggling opposition made no headway despite highlighting problems like income disparity, restrictions on free speech, overcrowding caused by immigration, infrequent breakdowns in public transportation and the rising cost of living.
The PAP had campaigned on the theme that voting for the opposition would produce a second-rate government and squander the economic gains achieved over the past 50 years.
The message resonated with voters and perhaps even scared the fence-sitters into going back to a tried and trusted party, resulting in the stronger mandate for the PAP.
“All this is a mandate for authoritarianism and brainwashing. It shows what you do when you control everybody’s housing, you control their savings, you control their jobs, because you’re the major employer, you control all the media,” Reform Party Secretary-General Kenneth Jeyaretnam said.
FALSE DOCUMENTS? Actor William Liao said he was ‘voluntarily cooperating’ with police after a suspect was accused of helping to produce false medical certificates Police yesterday questioned at least six entertainers amid allegations of evasion of compulsory military service, with Lee Chuan (李銓), a member of boy band Choc7 (超克7), and actor Daniel Chen (陳大天) among those summoned. The New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office in January launched an investigation into a group that was allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified medical documents. Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) has been accused of being one of the group’s clients. As the investigation expanded, investigators at New Taipei City’s Yonghe Precinct said that other entertainers commissioned the group to obtain false documents. The main suspect, a man surnamed
DEMOGRAPHICS: Robotics is the most promising answer to looming labor woes, the long-term care system and national contingency response, an official said Taiwan is to launch a five-year plan to boost the robotics industry in a bid to address labor shortages stemming from a declining and aging population, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. The government approved the initiative, dubbed the Smart Robotics Industry Promotion Plan, via executive order, senior officials told a post-Cabinet meeting news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s population decline would strain the economy and the nation’s ability to care for vulnerable and elderly people, said Peter Hong (洪樂文), who heads the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Department of Engineering and Technologies. Projections show that the proportion of Taiwanese 65 or older would
Democracies must remain united in the face of a shifting geopolitical landscape, former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) told the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday, while emphasizing the importance of Taiwan’s security to the world. “Taiwan’s security is essential to regional stability and to defending democratic values amid mounting authoritarianism,” Tsai said at the annual forum in the Danish capital. Noting a “new geopolitical landscape” in which global trade and security face “uncertainty and unpredictability,” Tsai said that democracies must remain united and be more committed to building up resilience together in the face of challenges. Resilience “allows us to absorb shocks, adapt under
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it is building nine new advanced wafer manufacturing and packaging factories this year, accelerating its expansion amid strong demand for high-performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The chipmaker built on average five factories per year from 2021 to last year and three from 2017 to 2020, TSMC vice president of advanced technology and mask engineering T.S. Chang (張宗生) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Hsinchu City. “We are quickening our pace even faster in 2025. We plan to build nine new factories, including eight wafer fabrication plants and one advanced
RSS