GE2025: Chan Chun Sing to lead PAP team in Tanjong Pagar; newcomer Foo Cexiang replaces Indranee

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SINGAPORE - The PAP kept its cards close to its chest for Tanjong Pagar GRC until the very end, revealing the slate of candidates only at around 11.30am, before nominations closed at noon on April 23.

Education Minister Chan Chun Sing, 55, will lead the PAP team in Tanjong Pagar, taking on board newcomer Foo Cexiang, 40.

Mr Foo, a former director at the Ministry of Transport, is making his electoral debut in the May 3 general election.

Also on the team are incumbents Joan Pereira, 57, and Alvin Tan, 44, who is Minister of State for Trade and Industry and Culture, Community and Youth.

Rounding out the five-member team is Ms Rachel Ong, 52, whose Telok Blangah ward under West Coast GRC is now part of Tanjong Pagar.

The PAP is facing a team from the People’s Alliance for Reform (PAR), comprising Mr Prabu Ramachandran, a 36-year-old commercial banker; Mr Nadarajan Selvamani, a 59-year-old director of a private school; Mr Rickson Giauw, 67, a site safety adviser and officer; Ms Han Hui Hui, a 34-year-old human rights fellow at a foreign university; and Mr Soh Lian Chye, 60, a senior logistics assistant.

PAR is an alliance of three parties: the Peoples Voice, the Reform Party and the Democratic Progressive Party.

The PAP’s six-decade-strong hold in Tanjong Pagar GRC proved to be a sparring point between the incumbent party and the PAR.

In his English speech at the nomination centre, Mr Chan noted that residents there have worked with the PAP for “60 years and counting”.

“We will keep working with fellow residents in Tanjong Pagar and Singapore to make sure that we have an even brighter future, regardless of the challenges ahead,” said Mr Chan, who also spoke in Mandarin and Malay.

In response, PAR’s anchor candidate, Mr Prabu, said the PAP’s long tenure is a sign that it is time for a change in the GRC.

“No more blank cheques to the PAP, not just in these 10 days of campaign period, but across five years in Parliament,” he added.

Parties will campaign over nine days before Cooling-off Day on May 2. Singaporeans go to the polls on the following day.

The contest for Tanjong Pagar GRC was the subject of intense speculation when Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office Indranee Rajah, 62, announced on April 21 that

she would move to anchor the Pasir Ris-Changi GRC slate

– taking over from Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean, 70.

On April 23, it was revealed that Mr Foo is taking over Ms Indranee’s slot in Tanjong Pagar GRC, one of three GRCs where the PAP did not reveal its slate of candidates before Nomination Day.

The other two are East Coast and Punggol GRCs.

Meanwhile, Mr Eric Chua, 45, who helmed the Queenstown ward previously under Tanjong Pagar GRC, is the PAP candidate for the new Queenstown SMC.

Mr Chua, who made his political debut in 2020, is Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Culture, Community and Youth as well as Social and Family Development.

He is facing PAR’s Mr Mahaboob Batcha, an oil and gas company director. The 57-year-old is contesting his first general election.

Over at Radin Mas SMC, PAP’s Mr Melvin Yong, 53, is in a three-cornered fight with PAR’s Mr Kumar Appavoo, a 56-year-old businessman, and independent candidate Darryl Lo Kar Keong, 28.

In the 2020 General Election, Mr Yong, who is an assistant secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress, won 74.03 per cent of the vote against Mr Kumar, who was contesting under the Reform Party banner.

Radin Mas was the second-highest-scoring constituency for the PAP in 2020, after Jurong GRC.

Mr Lo, who had earlier announced his intention to make a bid for Radin Mas SMC, has a law degree from the Singapore Management University.

He was listed as unemployed in the nomination papers, but previously said he had worked for start-ups in the technology sector.

This was according to his Instagram posts, where he first announced his intention to run as an independent in Radin Mas.

Speaking after submitting his nomination papers, Mr Lo said residents had sent him messages where they described him as “a breath of fresh air”.

He said he is committed to “deep dive” into housing and job security issues as a full-time MP.

Mr Lo, who said he hopes to hold an online rally, added that he is funding and managing his campaign by himself. Admitting that he was nervous about his first public speech, he said: “I hope that people can see that I really try my best in expressing myself. I have no skeletons in my closet.”

Tanjong Pagar GRC has been a PAP stronghold since Singapore’s founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew won the single seat in 1955.

Mr Lee, who died in 2015, helmed the constituency for almost 60 years. 

It became a GRC in 1991 and saw multiple walkovers until 2015, when Singaporeans First, or SingFirst, led by former presidential candidate Tan Jee Say, contested the general election.

The PAP won with 77.7 per cent of the vote.

In the 2020 General Election, PAP took 63.13 per cent of the vote against the Progress Singapore Party.

On May 3, some 139,688 voters will get to choose the party to represent them in Tanjong Pagar GRC.

Additional reporting by Joyce Teo, Vanessa Paige Chelvan, Amandai Chai and Sarah Stanley