Ex-NCMP Daniel Goh says he is expelled from Workers' Party

SINGAPORE: Former Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) Daniel Goh said on Thursday (Jun 1) that he has been expelled from the Workers' Party (WP).

The reason for the expulsion given to him in a letter by WP pertains to him disclosing information about the "inner workings" of the opposition party, he added in a Facebook post.

He attached a redacted copy of the WP letter in his post, adding that he was doing so as the party's Central Executive Committee (CEC) had "requested nicely" that he not disclose the correspondence due to information about the “inner workings” of the party.

"Though ironically that is the very reason given for the expulsion. Such is the closed loop in the lack of accountability," he wrote.

When contacted, WP declined comment.

According to the redacted letter Associate Professor Goh posted, his expulsion is to take "immediate effect". 

Although Assoc Prof Goh did not elaborate on what "inner workings" of the party he was referring to, he had in 2022 said that WP had set up a disciplinary committee to look into his Facebook posts on the Raeesah Khan saga.  

He had claimed then that WP said the committee wanted to interview him as his posts had allowed WP’s “political opponents” to have an inside understanding of how the party operates, and had “cast a cloud” on the character of the leadership of the party.

Assoc Prof Goh had made several Facebook posts about how the party has handled Ms Raeesah’s admission on Nov 1 in 2021 that she had lied in Parliament.

Ms Raeesah had stepped down in November 2021 after admitting to lying in Parliament. She was found guilty of abusing parliamentary privilege and fined S$35,000. 

In one Facebook post, Assoc Prof Goh had urged the party's disciplinary panel - which was tasked to look into Ms Raeesah’s admission of lying - not to “throw her under the bus”.  

In his Facebook post on Thursday, Assoc Prof Goh, who is currently associate provost of undergraduate education at the National University of Singapore (NUS), said that "his retirement from politics is complete" with the expulsion. 

"With this closure, I can now focus on serving my country in my responsibilities in NUS," he said. 

"Gotta update my CV to say I was expelled from WP for calling out the leadership."

A sociologist at NUS, he started volunteering with WP in the 2011 General Election and joined as a member in 2013. 

In the 2015 polls, he was among the candidates in the WP team who contested but lost in the East Coast Group Representation Constituency.

WP later nominated him to take up the NCMP post after its member Lee Li Lian, who lost the Punggol East ward to Mr Charles Chong from the People’s Action Party, declined to take up the seat.

He had stepped down from his appointments in the party’s CEC in 2020 to focus on recovering from an unspecified “health condition” and did not contest the General Election that year. 

This story was originally published in TODAY.