Singapore General Elections 2025: A Mandate And Emergence Of A ‘One And A Half Party’ Political System – Analysis
The city-state of Singapore held its 14th General Election (GE) on 3 May 2025. The incumbent PAP sought a mandate from voters to steer Singapore through the Tariff War between the United States and its trading partners that has upended the rules of international trade and diplomacy which Singapore relied on since its independence in 1965 (Bloomberg, 4 May 2025).
Singapore’s trade-to-GDP ratio is over 300 percent and is a litmus test for the “health” of global trade (Council on Foreign Relations, 16 April 2020). With the ongoing Tariff War, the Singapore manufacturing PMI dipped to 50.7 in February 2025, the lowest in seven months.
Framed against a background of geopolitical uncertainties and economic disruptions, in GE 2025, Singapore voters chose a “flight to safety” path in governance. The incumbent People’s Action Party (PAP) won 87 seats of the 97 parliamentary seats and provided the mandate asked for by Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (Reuters, 4 May 2025).
Singapore is a rare city-state that is multiethnic and diverse with a population of just over six million, where approximately 3.64 million are citizens and 2.75 million were eligible voters. With 2.38 million valid votes cast in GE 2025, the incumbent PAP improved its vote share to 65.57 percent from 61.24 percent in GE 2020.
Contrary to global trends of electoral systems, the PAP has been in government since Singapore’s independence in 1965. This longevity in government is rare and given its diversity, multicultural politics is thriving in Singapore, unlike in most other democracies.
Singapore’s GE2025 was significant due to first, the extensive electoral boundary changes that has come under great scrutiny and labelled as political gerrymandering by some critics. Second, the process of political leadership renewal within the PAP’s leadership ranks that was delayed by the Covid pandemic.
The Electoral Boundary Review Commission (EBRC) Report released on 11 March 2025 recommended 22 changes in the 31 constituencies. The electoral division (ED) realignments have also affected “hotly” contested wards in the last GE 2020 such as the West Coast Group Run Constituency (GRC) and East Coast GRC (EBRC Report, 11 March 2025).
Prior to and on Nomination Day on 23 April for candidates standing in the GE, twenty PAP parliamentarians announced they would not be contesting in the GE. They included Senior Minister (SM) Teo Chee Hean and Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) Heng Swee Keat, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office Maliki Osman and Singapore’s longest serving Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen (Straits Times, 24 April 2025).
The PAP fielded 32 new candidates this GE, which included former senior civil servants, professionals, entrepreneurs, and social activists, to represent a third of the available 97 seats in parliament. Several of these new PAP candidates are primed to eventually replace retiring ministers.
There were 12 political parties including the PAP contesting in GE2025 (Channel News Asia, 23 April 2025). The main opposition, the Workers Party (WP) had also unveiled a slate of professionally qualified new candidates that “mirrors” those on the PAP slate. The WP’s strategy focused on the electoral wards in the Northeast and East of Singapore, and they had fielded 26 candidates to contest in five GRCs and three Single Member Constituencies (SMCs).
There were ten WP MPs in the last parliament and the WP is often labelled in a PAP-lite manner. The increase in the number of opposition MPs in the last Parliament coincided with the rise in the number of sittings to 162 from 135 in the previous year (Straits Times, 21 April 2025).
The number of PAP backbenchers that spoke during question time also increased by 65 percent from the thirteenth parliament. Similarly, parliamentary questions from the opposition increased by 164 percent which indicates that more diverse views are being included (21 April 2025).
In terms of political strategy, apart from leadership renewal, political parties would also need to manage the impact of the EBRC Report. Several political shifts were seen after the EBRC Report was released, among them:
First, with the inclusion of MacPherson SMC into the Marine Parade – Braddel Heights GRC, the PAP had fortified its stronghold. The PAP incumbent MP for McPherson, Tin Pei Ling won her third term in GE2020 with 71.74 percent against the opposition People’s Power Party (PPP) at 28.26%.
The main opposition WP chose not to contest the GRC and deployed their candidates elsewhere, leaving the GRC uncontested and giving the PAP a “walkover.” Some critics commented that another opposition party should have been invited to contest there like in other electoral wards.
Second, in Bukit Batok single member constituency (SMC), where Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) veteran opposition figure Dr. Chee Soon Juan had been contesting for the past few GEs, the SMC was absorbed into the new Jurong East-Bukit Batok GRC. As a result, Dr Chee Soon Juan moved from Bukit Batok SMC to contest the Sembawang West SMC. In GE 2025, Dr. Chee lost to PAP candidate Poh Li San who polled 53.19 percent of the votes.
Third, the hotly contested West Coast-Jurong West GRC in GE 2020, saw a rematch between the PAP and People Solidarity Party (PSP), with National Development Minister Desmond Lee facing off against former PAP stalwart Dr Tan Cheng Bock. In GE 2020, PSP, led by Dr Tan Cheng Bock, grabbed 48.31 per cent of the vote at West Coast GRC and narrowly lost to the PAP with 51.69 percent of the votes.
In GE2025, the Taman Jurong ward of 41,404 electors, formerly held by President Tharman was absorbed into the GRC. The PAP won 60.01 percent of the votes against the PSP’s 39.99 percent.
The realignment of the electoral divisions has affected most wards including those deemed to be “hotspots” such as the West GRC -Jurong West GRC, and East Coast GRC, among others.
The EBRC in its evaluation process highlighted that its aim was to have an MP for every 28,510 voters. This works out to approximately 111,000 voters for a 4-MP GRC and 143,000 voters for a 5-MP GRC. In a move towards transparency, the EBRC’s report provided the following reasoning and method of analysis (EBRC Report, 11 March 2025).
First, it proposed electoral divisions (EDs) with significant growth of electors since the last GE to have their electoral boundaries redrawn such as Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC, Hong Kah North SMC, Sembawang GRC and Tampines GRC.
Second, it proposed redrawing boundaries of EDs that had been affected by changes in adjacent EDs such as the creation of the new Punggol GRC. Therefore, the EBRC recommended merging the remaining polling districts of Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC with the adjacent polling districts from East Coast GRC, comprising the Loyang and Flora estates, to form a new 4-MP Pasir Ris-Changi GRC.
Third, the EBRC also recommended regularising some of the electoral boundaries along key geographical features. In particular, the public Housing and Development Board (HDB) developments under construction.
While the criteria used by the EBRC in its recommendations are justified, the timing of the Report released a few months before the GE was announced would have stretched the resources of the opposition. The EBRC could consider publishing its report earlier, in a non-election year to provide all political parties chances to understand electoral sentiments better in all wards.
While there was a national vote swing towards the PAP, the WP contested wards told a different story. The WP retained their 10 Parliamentary seats from GE 2020 and in the wards which they lost, they did put up a credible contest.
For example, in the Punggol GRC contest, the PAP slate with DPM Gan Kim Yong won 55.17 percent of the votes, while the WP gained 44.83 percent. It is likely that younger voters were more willing to vote for a credible opposition. Punggol GRC has a higher proportion of younger voters between 21 and 45 years among its 120,000 voters. In addition, Punggol GRC is adjacent to Aljunied GRC, a WP stronghold and adjacent to Sengkang GRC which the WP won in GE 2020 and retained in GE2025 with 56.31 percent of the votes from 52.13 percent in GE 2020.
In Tampines GRC which has a higher percentage of Malay voters, the PAP received 52.02 percent of the votes a decrease from 66.41 percent from GE 2020. In the new Tampines Changkat SMC, the PAP won with 56.17 percent. In the Jalan Kayu SMC, the PAP won by 51.47 percent of the votes, the narrowest victory margin in GE 2025.
In conclusion, taking on board the electoral changes by the EBRC, the opposition parties with lesser resources had to pivot to different electoral wards and had to cultivate voters from scratch. The main opposition, the WP, focused its limited resources to the Eastern and Northeastern electoral wards in which it was more familiar with to entrench its political hold. The scale of the political leadership renewal also caught many voters by surprise.
However, even in times of geopolitical and global economic uncertainties, voters have signalled, at least in the Eastern and Northeastern electoral wards that they would vote for a credible opposition like the WP. This is a sign of a discerning and maturing voting culture. Therefore, the mandate given to the PAP has been coupled with the emergence of a “one and a half party” political system.
