The Workers’ Party wants to get to a position where it is ready to step in and govern, should the ruling PAP suffer a “major malfunction”, said Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh.
“You want to be in a position where you can say: ‘Look, we’re ready because we’ve got these years of experience under our belt,’” he added.
This would be a “great insurance for Singapore”, said Mr Singh, who has been party chief since 2018.
“I’m not saying me and my colleagues today will be in that position, but we certainly want to put the party in that position,” he added.
Mr Singh, who was making his first podcast appearance, was responding to a question from former Malaysian health minister Khairy Jamaluddin on whether he could see a Singapore without the PAP at the helm. Mr Khairy and former Umno information chief Shahril Hamdan are hosts of popular Malaysian political podcast Keluar Sekejap, which translates into “out for a moment”.
In an almost two hour-long session uploaded onto YouTube on June 24, Mr Singh also said he would not want to be prime minister of Singapore.
“I think my role is to normalise the idea of an opposition in Singapore,” he said. He hopes to bring more like-minded people on board to achieve a “functioning and effective” parliamentary democracy.
His comments – filmed during a family holiday in Malaysia – come about two months after the 2025 General Election held on May 3.
The Straits Times
