2015 Singapore General Election

The 2015 Singaporean General Election were held on 11 September to form Singapore's Parliament. The previous Parliament was dissolved on 25 August 2015 by President Tony Tan on the advice of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, and candidates were nominated on 1 September that year.

The election was the first since Singapore's independence which saw all seats contested. Most of the seats were contested between two parties, with the only three-cornered fights occurring in three Single Member Constituencies. Using first-past-the-post voting, the election was also the first after the March 2015 death of Lee Kuan Yew (the nation's first Prime Minister and an MP until his passing) and Singapore's 50th anniversary celebration on 9 August that year.

Out of 89 seats, the People's Action Party (PAP) contested all and won 83, with the other 6 seats won by The Workers' Party of Singapore (WP); the single seat from Punggol East Single Member Constituency was the only seat to change hands, recaptured by PAP. Voter turnout was 93.56%, discounting overseas votes. PAP won its best results since 2001 with 69.86% of the popular vote, an increase of 9.72% from the previous election in 2011. WP scored 39.75% of votes in the 28 seats it contested, a drop of 6.83%. In the overall popular vote, WP scored 12.48% and the remaining seven parties less than 4% each. Three candidates failed to secure 12.5% of votes in their area and thus lost their electoral deposit.

Background

The maximum term of a Singaporean parliament is five years, within which it must be dissolved by the President and elections held within three months, as stated in the Constitution. As like the previous elections since 1959, voting is compulsory and results are based on the first-past-the-post system. Elections are conducted by the Elections Department, which is under the jurisdiction of the Prime Minister's Office.

The General Election was the 17th General Election in Singapore and is the 12th since independence in 1965. The election coincides with the golden jubilee of the Republic of Singapore's founding.

The governing People's Action Party (PAP) have secured their 14th consecutive term in office since 1959. This will be the PAP's third election with Lee Hsien Loong as its Secretary-General, and the country's first election after the passing of its founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. Analysts such as Kit Wei Zheng at Citigroup suggested in a report that an early election was indeed possible to garner "sympathy votes", it might well backfire. It is also the country's first election where there are no walkovers in any of the constituencies, as voting will take place in Tanjong Pagar GRC for the first time.

Political parties

Main article: List of political parties in Singapore

The governing People's Action Party (PAP) has been in power since 1959 and is currently led by the Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. The leading Opposition party is The Worker's Party, led by Low Thia Khiang, with 7 elected seats and 2 NCMP seats. The Singapore People's Party led by Chiam See Tong has 1 NCMP seat. A total of eight Opposition parties challenged the ruling party in this election.

Electoral divisions

Main article: List of Singaporean electoral divisions

The Electoral Boundaries Review Committee is convened before every general election to review electoral boundaries in view of population growth and shifts. The Committee is appointed by the Prime Minister. The new electoral divisions were published on 24 July 2015, indicating the beginning of an election cycle.

Changes in Group Representation Constituencies

Name of GRC	Changes
Aljunied GRC	No Change in Boundaries
Ang Mo Kio GRC	Absorbed Punggol South division from Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC (renamed to Sengkang South) and Western portions of Fernvale from Sengkang West SMC Carved out a majority of Kebun Baru division to Nee Soon GRC, while the Southern portion merged with Yio Chu Kang division
Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC	Absorbed northern portions of Moulmein division (Balestier, MacRitchie Reservoir and Novena) from Moulmein-Kallang GRC Divisions for Bishan East, Toa Payoh East and Toa Payoh West were renamed Bishan East-Thomson, Toa Payoh East-Novena and Toa Payoh West-Balestier, respectively
Chua Chu Kang GRC	Ward downsized to four members Carved out eastern portions of Yew Tee division to Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC, while Lim Chu Kang and western portions of Yew Tee was transferred to Nanyang Division
East Coast GRC	Ward downsized to four members Carved out Fengshan division into SMC, and Coney Island to Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC
Holland-Bukit Timah GRC	Absorbed a portion of West Coast GRC and parts of Moulmein division (Adam Road) from Moulmein-Kallang GRC
Jalan Besar GRC	New Constituency Formed from Moulmein-Kallang GRC (and a small portion of Moulmein division), Kreta Ayer-Kim Seng division from Tanjong Pagar GRC, and Whampoa SMC
Jurong GRC	Absorbed Clementi division from West Coast GRC Carved out Bukit Batok division into SMC
Marine Parade GRC	Absorbed Joo Chiat SMC Carved out MacPherson division into SMC
Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC	New Constituency Formed with Yew Tee division (and carving out Limbang division) from Chua Chu Kang GRC, and Marsiling and Woodgrove divisions from Sembawang GRC
Nee Soon GRC	Absorbed Kebun Baru division from Ang Mo Kio GRC Carved out Canberra and eastern and northern Yishun portions to Sembawang GRC
Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC	Carved out Punggol South division to Ang Mo Kio GRC Northern portions of Punggol North and Punggol West were carved to form Punggol Coast division
Sembawang GRC	Absorbed Canberra division and portions of Chong Pang, Nee Soon East and Nee Soon South divisions from Nee Soon GRC (forming Gambas division) Carved out Marsiling and Woodgrove divisions to Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC
Tampines GRC	No Change in Boundaries
Tanjong Pagar GRC	Absorbed a majority of Moulmein division from Moulmein-Kallang GRC Carved out Kreta Ayer-Kim Seng division to Jalan Besar GRC
West Coast GRC	Ward downsized to four members Carved out Clementi division (and Faber private estate from Ayer Rajah division) to Jurong GRC

Timeline

Date	Event
May 2015	Formation of Electoral Boundaries Review Committee
13 July 2015	Announcement of EBRC formation
24 July 2015	Publication of Electoral Boundaries report
27 July 2015	Certification of Registers of Electors
25 August 2015	Dissolution of 12th Parliament; Writ of Election issued
28 August 2015	Deadline of Submission of Political Donation Certificates
1 September 2015	Nomination Day/Live Forum Broadcast
1–9 September 2015	Campaigning Period
3 September 2015	First Live Political Party Broadcast
10 September 2015	Cooling-off Day/Second Live Political Party Broadcast
11 September 2015	Polling Day
15 September 2015	Overseas Votes Counting
16 September 2015	Candidates revealed for Non-Constituency Member of Parliament
1 October 2015	13th Parliament assembled
15 January 2016	Opening of 13th Parliament

Election results

Signs pointing to polling stations in Clementi, in Holland-Bukit Timah GRC

After polls closed at 8pm, vote counting began. Results were announced by Ng Wai Choong, chief executive director of the Energy Market Authority, who acted as the Returning Officer for the election. The first result was declared at 11.31pm on 11 September where PAP candidate Lam Pin Min won the Sengkang West Single Member Constituency with a majority of 17,564. The last result was declared at 3.10am on 12 September where Workers' Party team contesting Aljunied Group Representation Constituency, led by party's secretary-general Low Thia Khiang, won the constituency by a narrow margin of 1.9%, or a majority of 2,612.

Contrary to expectations of a tougher contest with all constituencies being contested by the opposition parties, PAP won its best ever results since the 2001 general election, achieving a swing of 9.7% to achieve 69.9% of the vote as compared to the previous election in 2011 when it received 60.1%. The PAP unexpectedly reclaimed the constituency of Punggol East after it was lost to WP in a 2013 by-election, and achieved a swing in Aljunied GRC large enough to force a vote recount although the WP retained the constituency. With six elected seats for WP, three seats for the Non-Constituency Member of Parliament were eligible to complete a minimum of nine opposition members; WP was qualified for all three seats by-virtue of being the top three losing performers for the election (the single member constituencies of Punggol East (later declined) and Fengshan, and one seat (later two) for the East Coast Group Representation Constituency), and thus WP had nine represented seats for the upcoming Parliament.

The victory for the Potong Pasir Single Member Constituency has post its widest swing among all other Single Member Constituencies for this election, with 16.05%, while the largest swing for all contested constituencies was Bishan-Toa Payoh Group Representation Constituency, with 16.66%. This victory resulted in the end of a 31-year reign of Singapore People's Party as they failed to win at least a seat in Parliament (including NCMPs) for the first time, despite Potong Pasir was SPP's best performing constituency for the election. Consequently, this was also the first time since 1986 only one opposition party (Singapore Democratic Party, at the time) represented the Parliament, and after the 1981's Anson's by-election where WP being the only opposition party to represent the Parliament alone, as none of the other seven opposition parties, including SPP and two independents, won contests.

Voter turnout for the election was 93.56%, with 2,304,331 votes cast.

In an election's first, sample counts were released by the Elections Department to prevent speculation and misinformation from unofficial sources while counting is underway. All sample counts were released by 10PM – two hours after polling ended. With the exception of Aljunied and Punggol East, where counts were within a 4% error margin, all other figures showed that PAP had comfortable leads in 26 electoral divisions, while WP led in one electoral division.

Candidates and results of 2015 Singaporean general election
Division	Seats	Voters	Party	Candidate(s)	Votes	Votes %	Sample counts
Bukit Batok SMC	1	27,077		David Ong Kim Huat	18,204	72.99% || 74%
				Sadasivam Veriyah	6,585	26.40% || 26%
			Independent	Samir Salim Neji (Loses deposit)	150	0.60% || 0%
Bukit Panjang SMC	1	34,317		Khung Wai Yeen	10,143	31.62% || 31%
				Teo Ho Pin	21,935	68.38% || 69%
Fengshan SMC	1	23,427		Cheryl Chan Wei Ling	12,398	57.52% || 57%
				Dennis Tan Lip Fong	9,158	42.48% || 43%
Hong Kah North SMC	1	28,145		Amy Khor Lean Suan	19,612	74.76% || 74%
				Ravi Philemon	6,621	25.24% || 26%
Hougang SMC	1	24,097		Lee Hong Chuang	9,543	42.31% || 42%
				Png Eng Huat	13,012	57.69% || 58%
MacPherson SMC	1	28,511		Chen Jiaxi Bernard	8,826	33.60% || 36%
				Cheo Chai Chen (Loses deposit)	215	0.82% || 1%
				Tin Pei Ling	17,227	65.58% || 63%
Mountbatten SMC	1	24,143		Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss	5,992	28.16% || 28%
				Lim Biow Chuan	15,290	71.84% || 72%
Pioneer SMC	1	25,458		Cedric Foo Chee Keng	17,994	76.34% || 78%
				Ong Beng Soon Elvin	5,578	23.66% || 22%
Potong Pasir SMC	1	17,407		Lina Chiam	5,353	33.59% || 32%
				Sitoh Yih Pin	10,581	66.41% || 68%
Punggol East SMC	1	34,466		Charles Chong You Fook	16,957	51.76% || 51%
				Lee Li Lian	15,801	48.24% || 49%
Radin Mas SMC	1	28,906	Independent	Han Hui Hui (Loses deposit)	2,629	10.04% || 9%
				Kumar Appavoo	3,329	12.71% || 14%
				Sam Tan Chin Siong	20,230	77.25% || 77%
Sengkang West SMC	1	30,119		Koh Choong Yong	10,716	37.89% || 37%
				Lam Pin Min	17,564	62.11% || 63%
Yuhua SMC	1	22,617		Grace Fu Hai Yien	15,298	73.54% || 72%
				Jaslyn Go Hui Leng	5,505	26.46% || 28%
Chua Chu Kang GRC	4	119,931		Gan Kim Yong Low Yen Ling Yee Chia Hsing Zaqy Mohamad	84,731	76.89% || 76%
			Template:SG/PPP	Goh Meng Seng Lee Tze Shih Low Wai Choo Syafarin Bin Sarif	25,460	23.11% || 24%
East Coast GRC	4	99,118		Gerald Giam Yean Song Daniel Goh Pei Siong Mohamed Fairoz Bin Shariff Leon Perera	35,547	39.27% || 39%
				Lee Yi Shyan Lim Swee Say Mohd Maliki Bin Osman Tan Soon Neo Jessica	54,981	60.73% || 61%
Holland-Bukit Timah GRC	4	104,491		Chee Soon Juan Chong Wai Fung Md Sidek Bin Mallek Paul Anantharajah Tambyah	31,380	33.38% || 34%
				Christopher de Souza Liang Eng Hwa Sim Ann Vivian Balakrishnan	62,630	66.62% || 66%
Jalan Besar GRC	4	102,540		Chan Sio Phing Frieda L Somasundaram Redzwan Hafidz Abdul Razak Adrian Sim Tian Hock	30,283	32.27% || 33%
				Heng Chee How Lily Neo Denise Phua Lay Peng Yaacob Ibrahim	63,561	67.73% || 67%
Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC	4	107,599		Damanhuri Bin Abas Bryan Lim Boon Heng Tan Liang Joo, John Wong Souk Yee	31,157	31.27% || 31%
				Halimah Yacob Ong Teng Koon Alex Yam Ziming Lawrence Wong	68,485	68.73% || 69%
West Coast GRC	4	99,300		Foo Mee Har Lim Hng Kiang S Iswaran Patrick Tay Teck Guan	71,091	78.57% || 78%
				Kenneth Andrew Jeyaretnam Noraini Yunus Darren Soh Guan Soon Andy Zhu Laicheng	19,392	21.43% || 22%
Aljunied GRC	5	148,142		Chen Show Mao Sylvia Lim Low Thia Khiang Muhamad Faisal bin Abdul Manap Pritam Singh	69,929	50.95% || 52%
				Chua Eng Leong K Muralidharan Pillai Lye Thiam Fatt Joseph Victor Shamsul Kamar bin Mohamed Razali Yeo Guat Kwang	67,317	49.05% || 48%
Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC	5	129,975		Chee Hong Tat Chong Kee Hiong Ng Eng Hen Saktiandi Supaat Josephine Teo	86,514	73.59% || 74%
				Law Kim Hwee Long Yaoguang, Don Bryan Mohamad Abdillah Bin Zamzuri Mohamad Hamim Bin Aliyas Benjamin Pwee	31,049	26.41% || 26%
Jurong GRC	5	130,498		Ang Wei Neng Desmond Lee Rahayu Binte Mahzam Tharman Shanmugaratnam Tan Wu Meng	95,080	79.28% || 78%
			Template:SG/SFP	Foo Ming Jin David Sukdeu Singh Tan Peng Ann Wong Chee Wai Wong Soon Hong	24,848	20.72% || 22%
Marine Parade GRC	5	146,244		Fatimah Binte Abdul Lateef Goh Chok Tong Seah Kian Peng Tan Chuan Jin Tong Chun Fai Edwin Charles	84,939	64.07% || 65%
				Firuz Khan He Ting Ru Ng Foo Eng Dylan Terence Tan Yee Jenn Jong	47,629	35.93% || 35%
Nee Soon GRC	5	132,289		Foo Seck Guan Kenneth Gurmit Singh S/O Sadhu Singh Luke Koh Tiong Yee Cheryl Denise Loh Xiu Wen Ron Tan Jun Yen	40,796	33.17% || 33%
				K. Shanmugam Kwek Hian Chuan Henry Lee Bee Wah Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim Ng Kok Kwang Louis	82,197	66.83% || 67%
Sembawang GRC	5	144,672		Abdul Rasheed S/O Y Abdul Kuthus Kevryn Lim Spencer Ng Chung Hon Yadzeth Bin Haris Eugene Yeo Ren Yuan	37,067	27.72% || 28%
				Khaw Boon Wan Lim Wee Kiak Amrin Amin Ong Ye Kung Vikram Nair	96,639	72.28% || 72%
Tampines GRC	5	143,518		Baey Yam Keng Cheng Li Hui Desmond Choo Pey Ching Heng Swee Keat Masagos Zulkifli Bin Masagos Mohamad	95,202	72.06% || 72%
				Choong Hon Heng Fong Chin Leong Lim Tean Nor Lella Teo Kway Huang Sebastian	36,920	27.94% || 28%
Tanjong Pagar GRC	5	130,752	Template:SG/SFP	Ang Yong Guan Chirag Praful Desai Chiu Weng Hoe Melvyn Mohamad Fahmi Bin Ahmad Rais Tan Jee Say	25,953	22.29% || 22%
				Chan Chun Sing Chia Shi-Lu Indranee Thurai Rajah Joan Pereira Melvin Yong Yik Chye	90,448	77.71% || 78%
Ang Mo Kio GRC	6	187,771		Ang Hin Kee Darryl David Wilson Gan Thiam Poh Intan Azura Mokhtar Koh Poh Koon Lee Hsien Loong	135,115	78.63% || 78%
				Gilbert Goh Jesse Loo Hoe Bock Roy Ngerng Yi Ling Osman Sulaiman M Ravi Siva Chandran	36,711	21.37% || 22%
Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC	6	187,396		Abu Mohamed Harminder Pal Singh S/O Gurcharan Singh Desmond Lim Bak Chuan Lim Tung Hee Arthero Ong Teik Seng Wong Way Weng	46,508	27.11% || 27%
				Janil Puthucheary Ng Chee Meng Sun Xueling Teo Chee Hean Teo Ser Luck Zainal Sapari	125,021	72.89% || 73%