PAP fires salvo at SDP rivals in Holland-Bukit Timah
Dr Teo Ho Pin, Mr Liang Eng Hwa, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Ms Sim Ann and Mr Christopher De Souza arriving at at Assumption Pathway School nomination centre. Photo: Robin Choo
SINGAPORE — Hours after the General Election campaign for 2015 kicked off in earnest, the People’s Action Party (PAP) team in Holland-Bukit Timah has fired its first salvo at its challengers from the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP).
Noting that the SDP team for Holland-Bukit Timah has changed completely from 2011, the PAP’s team anchor Vivian Balakrishnan said he was glad SDP chief Chee Soon Juan is contesting this time.
He said his team would go into details over the next nine days, how the SDP’s alternative policies “ultimately leads to bankruptcy or perhaps even worse, passing the bill to the next generation”.
Calling the SDP’s proposals “tax-and-spend programmes”, Dr Balakrishnan said the SDP had copied policy prescriptions that have failed elsewhere. “I don’t intend to go into details now but in the course of the campaign, all this will be exposed and I’m sure our voters especially the voters in Holland-Bukit Timah will exercise judgment accordingly.”
He said his team – comprising Minister of State for Education and Communications and Information Sim Ann, Mr Liang Eng Hwa and Mr Christopher de Souza – have a proven track record in the group representation constituency.
Speaking in Mandarin at the press conference held in Bukit Panjang after nominations, where its manifesto for Holland-Bukit Timah was also issued, Ms Sim said Dr Chee was not a new face in the political arena. “Singaporeans of a certain age will know a bit about him, including how he ousted his mentor Mr Chiam See Tong from the party Mr Chiam had built,” she said, referring to the controversy in the 1990s where Mr Chiam was made to leave the party he founded.
“Given this, I think maybe the residents of Holland-Bukit Timah will be circumspect,” Ms Sim added.
Earlier at the Assumption Pathway School nomination centre, Dr Chee – who is standing in Holland-Bukit Timah with infectious diseases expert Paul Ananth Tambyah, nursing home administrator Chong Wai Fung and compliance auditor Sidek Mallek – had said he was looking forward to the campaign. “We’re looking forward to a good contest, a contest of ideas… we don’t want any of the gutter politics that have gone on in the past,” he said. “We want to campaign on things that Singaporeans really care about and that’s their housing, their population issues, their cost of living. These are things people want to hear us bring up and these are things we’re going to campaign very hard on.”
Asked if he was a changed man, Dr Chee, who last contested in 2001 after being unable to contest in 2006 and 2011 due to bankruptcy from lawsuits, said: “What’s changed is the perception of me and how that has come about is the advent of social media. Before that, the media could paint anything that (they) want about me and that was very difficult for me to counter. With opening up of new media perceptions have begun to change.”
