As campaigning in most of the nine single-member constituencies heats up, voters in one seat seem to be still grappling with just who their opposition candidate is.

Under the new electoral map, MacPherson has grown.

It has taken over two districts from Marine Parade, adding some 4,300 voters to the ward.

MacPherson is one of the oldest estates in Singapore; some of the flats here were built in 1964.

It is also the oldest estate in terms of the age of its residents -- there are more elderly people in MacPherson than anywhere else.

And this time, vying for their votes are People's Action Party incumbent Matthias Yao, and the Democratic Progressive Party's secretary-general Tan Soo Phuan.

"Last 10 years my grassroots and myslef have put in a lot of work, especially to upgrade the estate. And most of the older parts have been upgraded already," Mr Yao said.

DPP's Mr Tan said, "For the past decades, I've been touring the whole of Singapore, including MacPherson."

But take a drive through MacPherson and you'll be lucky to spot a poster from the DPP candidate.

Small wonder then, that few residents here know who their former grassroots adviser is contesting.

"It's a new opposition candidate here. I don't know his name. Haven't seen him before," one resident said.

"I don't care about the opposition, as long as the government takes good care of us," another said.

With most parts of the estates upgraded, MacPherson is now looking forward to more exciting things to come.

"In the next five or 10 years, because there is a new MRT station, the MacPherson station which will serve two lines, the Circle Line and the Eastern Regional Line, and this will be right here, in our estate," Mr Yao said.

"In the next five to 10 years, I think this estate will become a regional hub, and that will be a very exciting vision for us," he said.

These concrete development plans may prove difficult for the 65-year-old opposition candidate to counter.

"Our contest is not to be government officials, but to be the voice of justice for people, to fight for the people's right to survive," Mr Tan said.

It appears MacPherson residents are being offered a choice of either a better living environment, or more abstract concepts.