Singapore Democratic Party

Singapore Democratic Party
Leader	Chee Soon Juan
Founded	1980 (1980)
Headquarters	Singapore
Membership	1,000
Ideology	Liberalism, liberal democracy
International affiliation	Liberal International, Alliance of Democrats
Colours	Red, blue
Website
singaporedemocrat.org
Politics of Singapore Political parties Elections

The Singapore Democratic Party (abbrev: SDP; Chinese: 新加坡民主党; Tamil: சிங்கப்பூர் மக்களாட்சி; Malay: Parti Demokratik Singapura) is a political party in Singapore. The SDP was constituted in 1980 and it is the first opposition party in Singapore to have a youth wing, Young Democrats, and to deploy podcast as a media. It is also the first opposition party in Singapore to utilise blogging, political video and Internet forum to reach out to the people. The party is a member of Liberal International and the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats.

Central Executive Committee

The Central Executive Committee (CEC) governs the SDP. Its members are elected by the Party's cadre members at the Ordinary Party Conference held biennially. The present CEC comprises:

• Mr. Gandhi Ambalam, Chairman
• Mr. Francis Yong, Vice-Chairman
• Dr. Chee Soon Juan, Secretary-General
• Mr. John L. Tan, Assistant Secretary-General
• Mr. Hoe Poh Fatt, Treasurer
• Mr. Jeffrey George, Assistant Treasurer
• Mr. Lawrence Lai, Member
• Mr. Mohd Isa, Member
• Ms. Chee Siok Chin, Member
• Mr. Gerald Sng Choon Guan, Member
• Mr. Michael Hwang Ban Cheong, Member
• Mr. Lawrence Kang, Member

Chee Siok Chin is Dr Chee Soon Juan's sister.

The current Young Democrats president is Mr Priveen Suraj.

Affiliations

The SDP is a member of the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats (CALD, www.cald.net). As the name suggests, CALD is a regional organization of liberal and democratic parties whose objective is to promote democracy and protect human rights in Asia. Other members of CALD are:

• Democratic Progressive Party (Taiwan)
• Democrat Party (Thailand)
• Liberal Party (Philippines)
• National Council of the Union of Burma
• Parti Gerakan Rakyat (Malaysia)
• Sam Rainsy Party (Cambodia)

The SDP is also affiliated to or working in close co-operation with:

• Alliance for Reform and Democracy in Asia (www.asiademocracy.org)
• World Movement for Democracy (www.wmd.org)
• Sweden-Singapore Initiative for Democracy
• Community of Democracies NGO Process

The SDP youth wing, Young Democrats, is a member of:

• International Federation of Liberal Youth (IFLRY)
• Young Liberals and Democrats of Asia (YLDA)

History

The SDP was founded in 1980 by Mr Chiam See Tong, a British-educated lawyer who had contested several elections as an independent candidate since the mid 1970s. The party had originally wanted to contest the Anson constituency by-election in 1981 but for the sake of opposition unity, gave way to the Worker's Party candidate J.B. Jeyaretnam. It paid off, as the opposition won their first seat in parliament for the first time since Singapore's independence in 1965. The party's first success came in the 1984 General Elections, when their former secretary general Chiam See Tong won the Potong Pasir's seat despite some negative campaigning by the People's Action Party.

In the 1988 general elections, following the dismissal of J.B. Jeyaretnam from parliament in 1986 after a financial conviction, the party managed to defend its sole and only opposition seat. As a result, Chiam See Tong became the opposition leader in parliament. A moderate, Chiam claimed that he was not opposing for the sake of opposing. He also said: "But if they (the government) do the wrong things which are not good for Singapore, then we will oppose fearlessly" (Business Times: Dec. 15, 1980)

In the 1991 general elections, SDP achieved its biggest success ever, likely a result of employing a 'by-election' strategy where all the opposition parties agree to contest less than half the seats in parliament in total; this reassures voters that the ruling PAP party will be returned to power on nomination day, so it would be 'safe' to vote in some opposition candidates. The SDP won 3 seats at Potong Pasir SMC, Bukit Gombak SMC and Nee Soon Central SMC. The victory at Nee Soon Central was very close as the winning candidate Cheo Chai Chen only won by 168 votes against the PAP incumbent Ng Pock Too. Apart from Chiam See Tong and Cheo, the other winner was party chairman Ling How Doong.

Together with one seat won by the Workers' Party of Singapore in the same election, the opposition won a total of 4 seats. Though this was still very small compared to the 77 seats won by the PAP, the results were considered a grave setback to the ruling party and the then prime minister Goh Chok Tong, who was only in his first year in office. It was also the best ever opposition performance since 1963, when the Barisan Sosialis Party managed to win 13 out of 51 seats.

Buoyed by the results in 1991, the SDP decided to contest the 1992 Marine Parade Group Representation Constituency by-election. The GRC was held by none other than the then premier, Goh Chok Tong. Nonetheless, the SDP decided to put up a good fight by recruiting Dr Chee Soon Juan, a university lecturer, for the election. The PAP won 72% of the votes and the SDP won 25%, and other smaller parties won the rest of the votes.

However the rise of the SDP was not to be, as differences soon emerged between Chiam and Chee. In 1993, three months after joining the SDP, Chee was accused of using his research funds to send his wife’s PhD dissertation to the United States. Dr Chee had asserted, and still does, that this was not the case as his wife was an employee in the same department at National University of Singapore at that time and was working with him, sharing and collaborating in their research, and that the funds were legitimately used. The National University of Singapore decided to sack Chee.

Chee claimed this was a political vendetta plotted by the ruling party as his supervisor Mr S.R. Vasoo was a PAP MP. The PAP had, however, denied the accusation and insisted that the offence was real. Chiam wanted to censure Chee but the former was not supported by the Central Executive Committee and they voted to oust him as general secretary and to replace him with Chee. Supporters of Chiam left the party and formed the Singapore People's Party in 1994, which Chiam took over from Sin Kek Tong as the secretary-general in the 1997 general election.

The SDP decided to strip Chiam See Tong's membership after the latter had gone to the Singapore Press Club and denounced the SDP and the Central Executive Committee. Had he lost his membership, under the law, he would also have to lose his seat in parliament. The courts ruled that his dismissal was unfair and that he should be allowed to remain as a member of the SDP.

Meanwhile, Chee Soon Juan led the political struggle with the remaining members of the SDP. He published his second political book called Dare to Change in 1996. He has also frequently travelled abroad and spoken of Singapore's undemocratic situation to foreign media.

In the General Elections of 1997, the SDP suffered its greatest setback since its founding. The party lost all of its seats in parliament and its leader, Dr Chee Soon Juan failed to get himself elected as an MP. It was a setback for the opposition as they had only won 2 seats (one won by the Workers' Party of Singapore and the other by Chiam See Tong of the Singapore People's Party) and the opposition vote dropped from 40% to 35%.

In 1999, Dr Chee Soon Juan came to national attention when he gave a public speech in the financial district despite being denied a permit to speak publicly. He argued that the permit laws were draconian and it often took a longer time to approve than when the PAP-affiliated National Trades Union Congress protested outside the United States embassy in 1990 against what the government claimed the 'U.S interference of internal affairs'. Though it was not necessarily expressed, partly as a result of Chee's efforts, the government decided to open a speaker's corner at Hong Lim Park in 2000.

The party website was defaced by hackers on November 22, 2006. In the same month, Dr Chee Soon Juan was sentenced for speaking in public without a valid permit in which he received five weeks in jail.

General Election 2001

In the 2001 elections, the SDP failed to win any seat but captured national attention when during the campaign, Chee Soon Juan refused to greet Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong at a hawker centre, and along with his followers, lifted up their fists and chanted slogans. Later, from his campaign vehicle, Chee posed the following question to Goh Chok Tong: "Where is the S$18 billion that you have lent to Suharto?". The PAP took Chee Soon Juan to task, demanding he should apologise or else he would face defamation lawsuits. Under pressure from the governing party, Dr Chee and his party apparently apologised a day later. However, the party soon went on the offensive by continuing to criticise the PAP's economic policies and urged for the minimum wage of S$5 per hour for the rest of the campaign. The SDP's economic alternatives were later rebuked by the PAP as leading Singapore to bankruptcy and inflation.

In August 2005 the SDP launched a political podcast named RadioSDP, a first in Singapore, which is seen as a by-pass to the state-controlled mass media. Speeches of the SDP's leaders, analysis, interviews of dissidents in exile and call-in programmes was being podcast, in English, Chinese, Malay and Tamil.

General Election 2006

In March 2006, just before the Singapore general election, 2006, the local media began to report the presence of some disagreement among the leaders of the SDP. When Dr Chee was jailed for 7 days after failing to pay a fine for contempt of court, Chairman Ling How Doong was quoted saying that the party "would be run even better" without Chee. Ling was reported to have said that Dr Chee's preoccupation with "foreign issues" had isolated the SDP from the electorate, who are more concerned with bread and butter issues. Later, Chee Siok Chin said that the party remains united and denied any split in the party's ranks.

Singapore Rebel Controversy

In 2005, a documentary by Martyn See on Dr Chee was withdrawn from the Singapore International Film Festival after the government warned the director that he could be jailed over its political content. Martyn See's Singapore Rebel focuses on Dr Chee Soon Juan, who was ordered to pay 500,000 Singapore dollars to Lee Kuan Yew, and former leader Goh Chok Tong for defaming them during the 2001 elections. However, See decided to pull his movie from the film festival after the Board of Film Censors said he could be jailed for up to two years or fined S$100,000 if his 26 minute film was screened. The board had also advised festival organizers to remove See's documentary because it was a "party political film". Under Singaporean law, local films that "contain wholly or partly either partisan or biased references to or comments on any political matter" are banned.

Tak Boleh Tahan arrests and trial

Main article: Tak Boleh Tahan

On March 15, 2008, Chee Soon Juan and 17 others were arrested at an SDP-organized demonstration against rising living costs held outside Parliament and later charged with unlawful assembly. The trial began on October 23, 2008.

See also

• Contributions to liberal theory
• Liberal democracy
• Liberalism
• Liberalism worldwide
• List of liberal parties

References

• Mutalib, Hussin. 2004. Parties and Politics: A Study of Opposition Parties and the PAP in Singapore. (2nd ed.) Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Academic.

External links

• Singapore Democratic Party official site
• Press release on podcast