Opposition Progress Singapore Party set for hotly contested leadership election ahead of GE2025
(From left) Progress Singapore Party NCMP Leong Mun Wai, party chairman Tan Cheng Bock and NCMP Hazel Poa greeting residents during their party’s walkabout in Clementi Central on Feb 23.PHOTO: ST FILE
SINGAPORE – The Progress Singapore Party (PSP) will vote in its top leadership body on March 20, with 24 candidates set to vie for 12 elected seats on the central executive committee (CEC).
The current committee was elected in 2023, and comprises secretary-general Hazel Poa, former party chief Leong Mun Wai, chairman Tan Cheng Bock and 11 others.
The Straits Times has learnt that most of them, other than assistant secretary-general Ang Yong Guan, will seek re-election, alongside a mix of long-time volunteers and new faces.
Dr Ang said earlier in 2025 that he
would not stand in the CEC or general election following a three-year suspension of his medical licence.
The new CEC will later decide the party’s secretary-general – its leader.
Observers said the only two serious candidates for the post are its Non-Constituency MPs – Ms Poa and Mr Leong.
As the party gears up for the 2025 General Election, it would be surprising if its cadres chose anyone else for the top job, Singapore Management University law don Eugene Tan said.
He added: “With the original leaders from five years ago less prominent, Mr Leong and Ms Poa are most visible.”
The party’s roughly 100 cadres – its inner circle – will vote for 12 members of the new CEC on March 20. The CEC will then co-opt two more cadres to form a 14-member body, and later decide who will take up party leadership positions within it.
Mr Leong had
stepped down as secretary-general in February 2024, to take responsibility for a correction direction he received under Singapore’s fake news law for a social media post.
He is expected by some in the party to make a bid to retake the post from Ms Poa after the party’s top decision-making body has been voted in.
When approached by ST, Mr Leong did not comment on the CEC election, saying only that the results would be released after its conclusion.
Ms Poa did not respond when asked for comment.
If Mr Leong takes back the reins, it will be the fifth time the party has changed its leader since its founding in 2019.
Ms Poa is the PSP’s fourth secretary-general, and was the party vice-chairman prior to that.
Mr Leong, who currently does not hold any post on the CEC, first became secretary-general in April 2023.
Mr Francis Yuen
vacated the position the month before, after spending two years in the seat.
The PSP’s founder and current chairman, Dr Tan, was its first secretary-general.
Together with Dr Tan, Mr Leong and Ms Poa were on the PSP’s West Coast GRC slate that lost to a PAP team led by former transport minister S. Iswaran in the 2020 General Election.
It was the narrowest loss that year – which allowed the party to send Mr Leong and Ms Poa into Parliament as NCMPs.
The PSP is expected to contest several constituencies in the upcoming general election, including the
newly redrawn West Coast-Jurong West GRC, and the neighbouring Chua Chu Kang GRC.
Its slates in these wards have not been confirmed.
Political observer Gillian Koh said the PSP – a newcomer in GE2020 – managed to maintain its profile through the work of its two NCMPs in Parliament.
However, the party has had several switches at the secretary-general level, noted Dr Koh, a senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies. This could be due to its youth, she said.
SMU’s Associate Professor Tan said the new CEC will be the team that will lead the party into its second general election, adding that its performance there will determine the party’s trajectory for the coming decade.
Prof Tan noted that the PSP now has to chart its own way in an increasingly crowded and fragmented opposition political space.
He said: “The main challenge is whether it can maintain its place as the second leading opposition party after the Workers’ Party.
“Minimally, it will need to secure two NCMP seats in GE2025. Even better, if it can win outright elected seats.”
Prof Tan added that it may well be Dr Tan’s last electoral outing, so the party will have to demonstrate that it now has a separate and distinctive identity.
Dr Tan will turn 85 in April.
Prof Tan said: “Now that we are on the cusp of a GE, the party is desirous to show it is not the alter ego of Dr Tan.
“Will it be able to step out of Dr Tan’s shadow and show that it has political relevance beyond him?”
- Ng Wei Kai is a journalist at The Straits Times, where he covers politics. He writes Unpacked, a weekly newsletter on Singapore politics and policy.
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