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Reform Party (Singapore)

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This article is about the Singaporean political party. For other uses, see Reform Party (disambiguation).

The Reform Party
Malay nameParti Reformasi
Chinese name革新党
Géxīn Dǎng
Tamil nameசீர்திருத்தக் கட்சி Cīrtiruttak Kaṭci
ChairmanYasmine Valentina (acting)
Secretary-GeneralKenneth Jeyaretnam
FounderJ. B. Jeyaretnam
Founded3 July 2008; 16 years ago (2008-07-03)
Headquarters18A Smith Street
Singapore 058932
NewspaperThe New Dawn
Youth wingYoung Reformers
Ideology
Political positionCentre-left
Colours  Yellow
Parliament
0 / 104
Website
reform.sg

The Reform Party (abbreviation: RP) is an opposition political party in Singapore.

The Reform Party is a liberal-democratic party. According to the party's constitution, it seeks to promote "political, social and economic reform; the restoration of full human rights; a fairer and just distribution of wealth with the elimination of poverty; an independently appointed judiciary and a fully elected and sovereign parliament". Its stated philosophy is "That every member of the society is born with fundamental rights which cannot be abrogated... and that it is the paramount duty of the society to promote the human dignity of its every single member."[2]

It was founded by opposition veteran and lawyer J. B. Jeyaretnam, notable as the former Secretary-General of the Workers' Party of Singapore and the first opposition candidate in post-independence Singapore, on 3 July 2008. Around three months after the party's foundation, founder Jeyaretnam died on 30 September, and the leadership has since taken over by his son, Kenneth Jeyaretnam.[3]

History

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The Reform Party was founded by lawyer and veteran politician J.B. Jeyaretnam, notable as the first opposition candidate to be elected Member of Parliament under the Workers' Party of Singapore banner after a period of about 16 years when not a single opposition candidate in Singapore won a seat, as well as the secretary-general of the Workers’ Party from 1971 to 2001.

At the time, Jeyaretnam (then a Non-Constituency Member of Parliament) was sued by then-Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and then-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong over defamation at the total damages amounting S$565,000 including court costs of S$270,000, and was declared bankrupt (which also barred the right from standing in elections) after failing to follow up his payment. He subsequently resigned from his leadership post and party later, citing that the party (notably then-Secretary General Low Thia Khiang) did not receive due support to help him repay his payments. Since his resignation, Jeyaretnam authored the books Make it Right for Singapore and The Hatchet Man of Singapore and was often seen promoting his books outside Centrepoint, a shopping centre on Orchard Road. In May 2007, Jeyaretnam was discharged from bankrupt and eventually reinstated in the bar later September, in which he would go on to register and form Reform Party on 3 July 2008, where he became the pro-tem Secretary-General.

On 30 September, around three months after founding, Jeyaretnam died following a heart attack, and over a thousand people attended his funeral.[4] J.B. Jeyaretnam's son, Kenneth Jeyaretnam, who at the time resided with his British family in the United Kingdom and had previously never participated in politics directly, took over as secretary-general in April 2009.

On 8 May 2010, the party announced its six candidates well in advance of the upcoming General Election, which also include Kenneth.[5] However, several members who also joined the party resigned to join other parties, such as Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss, Tony Tan Lay Thiam and his wife Hazel Poa, Nicole Seah, James Teo, J. Sivalingam; Justin Ong, Samantha De Silva, Gan Theng Wei and Tan Tee Seng.[6] Earlier on, the party was initially invited by the Singapore Democratic Alliance (a collation formed by then-opposition MP Chiam See Tong of the Singapore People's Party, along with Justice Party and Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Singapura), but the CEC members of the alliance denied their request.

The party fielded two teams to contest in West Coast GRC and Ang Mo Kio GRC, which were respectively led by then-Minister of Trade & Industry Lim Hng Kiang and Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, both by People's Action Party (PAP). In his first campaign speech on late April 2011, Kenneth said that competition in politics would lead to better and more intelligent policies for Singapore. He also noted that the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) would likely open the floodgates to more foreigners to enter Singapore again once they formed the next government.

However, their electoral debut was unable to bear fruit, as both contests were lost to the PAP with a combined vote share of under 35% from the two constituencies that it contested. Some members subsequently left the party afterwards.

Their subsequent contests for the 2013 by-election and 2015 general elections neither see improvement in the party, as the party lost contests to the WP and PAP, respectively, by large margins.

In 2018, they were among the seven other opposition parties (the other were People's Power Party, Singaporeans First, Singapore Democratic Party, Democratic Progressive Party, National Solidarity Party, and People's Voice Party, the latter formed by former NSP chief Lim Tean) present in a meeting led by former PAP MP Tan Cheng Bock, in their discussion of a possibility of forming a collation for the next election.[7]

On 5 August 2020, chairman Andy Zhu and treasurer Noraini Yunus were removed by Jeyaretnam from the CEC with, CEC member Charles Yeo and deputy treasurer Mahaboob Batcha, taking their places as chairman and treasurer respectively.[8] Several members left the party and followed Zhu and Noraini to form the Singapore United Party.[9]

Objectives

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The slogan on the Reform Party's website states "Transparency, Accountability and Inclusion: A democratic Singapore for Singaporeans." In the 2015 elections, the party slogan was "A Brighter Future Tomorrow, Today".

The main objectives of the party stated in its constitution are: to maintain and promote an independently appointed judiciary and a fully elected and sovereign parliament; to ensure that every member of society is entitled to political, social and economic rights; and to eliminate poverty by enforcing a fairer and just distribution of wealth.

In its National Day Message 2015 published on 9 August 2015, the party stated, "We need to secure for Singaporeans a fairer distribution of the national wealth by redistributing some of the massive wealth hoarded by the PAP Government." It proposed to do this "without adopting a high tax regime which might damage Singapore's competitiveness", given the healthy state of Singapore's national finances.

On nomination day for the 2015 General Elections (1 September), the party proposed a S$500 monthly allowance to Singaporean citizens aged 65 years and above.[10]

Organisation

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The Reform Party is unique among the political parties in Singapore, both government and opposition, in that its party structure does not follow a cadre based system of political organisation.[11] The party constitution states that the Party Conference is the supreme governing authority.[2]

Leadership

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List of secretaries-general

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No Name Years
1 J. B. Jeyaretnam 2008–2009
2 Kenneth Jeyaretnam 2009–present

Central Executive Committee

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Title Name
Chair Yasmine Valentina
Secretary-General Kenneth Jeyaretnam
Treasurer Mahaboob Baatsha
Committee Member Thaddeus Thomas

Electoral performance

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General Election 2011

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In their inaugural election, the party garnered 31.8% of the votes contested in Ang Mo Kio and West Coast GRCs. Their overall popular vote was 4.3%.

By-election 2013

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A by-election in Punggol East Single Member Constituency was held on 26 January 2013 after the resignation of former parliamentary speaker Michael Palmer on 12 December 2012. Secretary-general Kenneth participated in the by-election, but was defeated to WP's Lee Li Lian in a rare four-cornered contest.[12] Additionally, due to a vote split towards the major parties, Kenneth had forfeited his S$14,500 election deposit as he garnered only 1.2% of the valid votes cast (per electoral rules, the threshold of retaining the deposit is 12.5%, or one-eighth, of the valid votes cast for the constituency).[13]

2015 general election

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Their second general election (and third overall) also fielded 11 candidates contested in three contested constituencies, with the addition of Radin Mas SMC, a ward part of the Jeyaretnam's former Anson constituency, and the two previously contested GRCs, Ang Mo Kio and West Coast. The election also marked the debut of activists Roy Ngerng and M Ravi. In their nomination speech for Ang Mo Kio GRC, Ravi's speech was made semi-viral after he accidentally chanted out PAP before quickly correcting to RP while persuading the voters to vote for their party. On 7 September, they subsequently released their manifesto.[14]

On 11 September, their electoral performance dwindled down compared to the last election as they garnered only 20.60% of the votes on the three constituencies contested, or 2.63% of the overall popular vote, which was mostly attributed to the large swing towards the ruling party, where they attained large winning margins.[15][16]

2020 general election

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The party fielded only six candidates and contested two constituencies, Ang Mo Kio GRC and Radin Mas;[17] in a breaking tradition, the party chose not to contest West Coast GRC,[18] which was reserved by the new party Progress Singapore Party led by former MP Tan Cheng Bock.[19]

Ahead of the elections, the party had accused the Progress Singapore Party for not living up to an agreement so that they could avoid a three way fight with the PAP in Yio Chu Kang SMC. In response, the PSP argued that no such agreement existed.[20] During the campaigning period, secretary-general Kenneth did not participate in the campaigning nor turn up for televised broadcasts as he was serving a mandatory 14-day Stay Home Notice after a visit to United Kingdom.[21]

On 10 July, the party won neither constituencies, with vote shares of 28.09% and 25.97% respectively. Though the party improved their party's vote share by 27.84% from the last election, their overall popular vote fell to 2.19%.[22][23]

Election results

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Parliament

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Election Seats up for election Seats contested by party Seats won by walkover Contested seats won Contested seats lost Total seats won Change Total votes Share of votes Popular vote Resulting Government Party leader
2011 87 11 0 0 11
0 / 87
 Steady 86,294 31.78% 4.28% No seats Kenneth Jeyaretnam
2015 89 11 0 0 11
0 / 89
 Steady 59,432 20.60% 2.63% No seats
2020 93 6 0 0 6
0 / 93
 Steady 54,505 27.84% 2.19% No seats

Parliament by-elections

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Election Seats up for election Seats contested by party Contested seats won Contested seats lost Total votes Share of votes Outcome of election Constituency contested
2013 1 1 0 1 353 1.2% No seat Punggol East SMC

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "About Us" http://reform.sg/?page_id=575 Archived 19 July 2015 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ a b "Our Constitution | The Reform Party". reform.sg. Archived from the original on 18 August 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  3. ^ Geoffrey Robertson (7 October 2008). "Joshua Jeyaretnam". The Guardian. Guardian News and Media Limited. Archived from the original on 3 September 2013. Retrieved 25 June 2012.
  4. ^ "Over 1,000 people turned up at JB Jeyaretnam's funeral". Channel News Asia. MediaCorp. 4 October 2008. Archived from the original on 11 December 2008. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
  5. ^ "Reform Party unveils six election candidates" Yawning Bread Archived 12 May 2010 at the Wayback Machine, 9 May 2010
  6. ^ "Several key members of Reform Party resign" [1] Archived 29 April 2011 at the Wayback Machine, 23 February 2011
  7. ^ "7 opposition parties discuss forming a new coalition, invite former PAP MP Tan Cheng Bock to be leader". The Straits Times. 28 July 2018. Archived from the original on 15 August 2018. Retrieved 29 July 2018.
  8. ^ "Charles Yeo becomes Reform Party chairman, party to conduct GE2020 post-mortem". Archived from the original on 6 August 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  9. ^ "Former Reform Party chairman Andy Zhu and others form new political party, Singapore United Party". The Straits Times. 3 January 2021.
  10. ^ Mediacorp Channel 5 News, 9 pm, 1 September 2015
  11. ^ "The cadre system, our biggest obstacle to democracy". Reinventing the Rice Bowl. Kenneth Jeyaretnam. Archived from the original on 13 July 2012. Retrieved 25 June 2012.
  12. ^ "WP's Lee wins Punggol East by-election". Channel NewsAsia. 26 January 2013. Archived from the original on 28 January 2013. Retrieved 15 September 2015.
  13. ^ "RP picks Kenneth Jeyaretnam as candidate for by-election". Channel NewsAsia. 15 January 2013. Archived from the original on 22 January 2013. Retrieved 15 September 2015.
  14. ^ Patrick John Lim (7 September 2015). "Reform Party unveils 12-page party manifesto". Channel NewsAsia. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 9 September 2015.
  15. ^ Ong, Justin (27 August 2015). "Reform Party unveils slate of candidates for West Coast, Radin Mas". Channel NewsAsia. Archived from the original on 29 August 2015. Retrieved 1 September 2015.
  16. ^ "GE2015: RP unveils Ang Mo Kio team led by M Ravi". TODAY Online. 28 August 2015. Archived from the original on 30 August 2015. Retrieved 1 September 2015.
  17. ^ Charmaine Ng (27 June 2020). "Singapore GE2020: Reform Party announces campaign slogan, manifesto". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 27 June 2020. Retrieved 27 June 2020.
  18. ^ Tee, Zhuo (24 June 2020). "GE2020: No more three-cornered fight in West Coast as Reform Party backs out". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 24 June 2020. Retrieved 24 June 2020.
  19. ^ Koh, Fabian (13 June 2020). "Progress Singapore Party close to finalising line-up for West Coast GRC team led by Tan Cheng Bock (premium)". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 28 June 2020. Retrieved 28 June 2020.
  20. ^ hermes (27 June 2020). "Singapore GE2020: Reform Party and PSP in dispute over 'deal' on Yio Chu Kang". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 29 June 2020. Retrieved 27 June 2020.
  21. ^ "GE2020: MOH rejects Reform Party chief Kenneth Jeyaretnam's request to waive stay-home notice". CNA. Archived from the original on 7 July 2020. Retrieved 9 July 2020.
  22. ^ "GE2020 official results: PAP wins Ang Mo Kio GRC with 72% against Reform Party". Straits Times. Archived from the original on 11 July 2020. Retrieved 11 July 2020.
  23. ^ "GE2020 results: PAP's Melvin Yong wins Radin Mas SMC with 74.03% of votes over RP's Kumar Appavoo". AsiaOne. Archived from the original on 12 July 2020. Retrieved 11 July 2020.
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