The Usual Place Podcast

GE2025: How did RDU scale up from contesting 1 constituency in 2020 to 4 this year 

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Meet RDU's new faces in this episode of The Usual Place podcast.

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Red Dot United (RDU) is a very young political party, formed only in 2020 when it contested just one constituency – Jurong GRC – with a team of five candidates. 

Fast forward five years, and RDU is now fielding the second-highest number of opposition candidates in this election, behind the WP’s 26 candidates.

RDU’s 15 candidates are contesting four constituencies, going head-to-head with the PAP.

How did the party scale up from a one-GRC showing in 2020 to four constituencies today?

Joining me in this noon livestream earlier on April 29 are Ms Liyana Dhamirah, 38, and her teammate Marcus Neo, 33 - part of the party’s team contesting Jurong East-Bukit Batok GRC - and Ms Kala Manickam, 57, candidate for Jurong Central SMC.

The Usual Place – a podcast by The Straits Times

– has moved from a weekly show to a half-hour daily live stream at noon from April 24 till May 1, the day before Cooling-off Day.

Highlights (click/tap above):

2:30 How a relatively new party like RDU managed to field the second largest number of opposition candidates

10:27 How Ms Liyana is able to dismiss a lot of insults; why file a police report over online harassment recently?

23:22 Ms Kala on switching from Jalan Kayu SMC to Jurong Central SMC

28:12 Mr Neo on housing and job insecurity as top concerns for millennial voters his age

36:18 Game time! Kopi-o kosong, bubble tea, teh tarik - what’s your favourite drink?

Today’s shirt worn by Natasha was sponsored by Good Addition.

Host: Natasha Zachariah (

natashaz@sph.com.sg

)

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Filmed by: Studio+65 

ST Podcast producers: Teo Tong Kai & Eden Soh

Shorts edited by: ST Video

Executive producers: Ernest Luis, Danson Cheong and Lynda Hong

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