Mountbatten MP makes it a point to know his residents

Apart from getting his kopi-o fix, the other constant when long-time Mountbatten resident C. Ng visits the Old Airport Road Food Centre near his home is bumping into his MP, Mr Lim Biow Chuan.

In fact, Mr Lim is such a fixture in the area that he is on a first-name basis with many people in the neighbourhood.

Walking around the food centre last Wednesday, he waved to a woman in a clothes-alteration store on the second floor of the food centre. "Alice, how are you?" he said.

Speaking in Mandarin, Mr Ng, 73, who did not want to give his full name, said: "There are some politicians you never see - or maybe only on TV. But residents here see Mr Lim all the time. Everyone knows him, and he knows everyone."

Mr Lim's popularity in the area is easy to gauge. During recent walkabouts at the food centre, patrons and hawkers called out to him like old friends. As he made his way through the breakfast crowd, patrons stopped him to chat or ask if they could buy him a cup of tea.

Mr Lim, 57, is soft-spoken and clearly happy to catch up with various people, whom he is able to recognise even when they have masks on.

Such familiarity has been built up through regular engagement with the residents in a constituency that has 24,246 voters.

In the July 10 General Election, Mr Lim won his third term in Mountbatten SMC, securing 73.82 per cent of the votes for the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) against Peoples Voice candidate Sivakumaran Chellappa.

In 2015, he garnered 71.86 per cent of the votes.

This year, the vote swing for the PAP in Mountbatten bucked the national trend.

Even Mr Lim was surprised by the winning margin.

He said: "Before Polling Day, I had in fact told my team to expect numbers to go down. We shouldn't expect to do as well as we did in 2015, where we were helped by the SG50 effect and the LKY effect."

Observers have said the PAP received a boost in the 2015 election due to sentiments linked to Singapore's 50th anniversary and the death of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew in March that year.

Besides his weekly Meet-the-People Sessions, Mr Lim also makes market and home visits at least once a week. At the weekends, he attends community events.

He said: "Going out there to really know the residents - that's important to me. As their MP, my role is to serve and to help as many of them as possible. If I don't go out there, how would I know what they want?"

Mr Lim's wife works in the finance sector, and they have two daughters, aged 19 and 21.

He entered politics in 2006 as a member of the Marine Parade GRC team before standing on his own in 2011, when Mountbatten became a single-member constituency.

Said Mr Lim: "Even though I have been an MP here for so long, I never take any vote for granted. I am very grateful that the residents have continued to put their trust in me. I will work hard."

When asked what plans he has for the constituency in the new term, he rattled off a long list of initiatives in the pipeline. For instance, there will be no let-up in the fight against dengue - there are several clusters in the area.

Another key focus will be road planning to make way for a new MRT station on the Thomson-East Coast Line. Mr Lim said he has been in touch with the authorities, providing details on traffic problems in part of the neighbourhood.

He also has an eye on integration efforts when about 1,000 families - mostly young ones - move in after two Build-To-Order projects are ready in the next few years.

He said: "This is an old estate, and most of the residents living in HDB flats here are seniors. With the injection of so many younger families, we'll have to see what we can do to integrate them and accommodate their needs, too."

About 60 per cent of the constituency is made up of private estates, while about 40 per cent comprises public housing, including several blocks of rental flats.

Mr Lim, the son of roadside fruit sellers, has a soft spot for helping the lower-income group in his constituency.

He said: "I went to university and became a lawyer, so I was lucky to break out of the poverty chain. I don't think it would be right to stand by and not help them in my position now."

Every Monday for the last two years, he has teamed up with volunteers to give needy residents a simple dinner - sponsored by donors as well as the Mountbatten Community Development and Welfare Fund.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the dinners were held at void decks, where residents would eat together and play a round of bingo.

Mr Lim said: "The idea was to get them to come out of their flats, socialise and get to know their neighbours. It's tough for some residents to live in cramped quarters all day."

With the Covid-19 restrictions, the void deck dinners have stopped. Instead, residents are asked to collect food packets. In the most recent distribution exercise, about 80 people collected their food packets.

Mr Lim said: "Many residents have e-mailed me about their concerns over jobs, too, so I'll see what I can do to link them up with the relevant agencies and help them.

"No matter what, the work continues."