2001 Singaporean general election

2001 Singaporean general election

← 1997 3 November 2001 2006 →
Members elected →
84 seats (only 29 seats contested) to the Parliament of Singapore 43 seats needed for a majority 1 NCMP seat offered
Turnout	94.6%
First party Second party Third party   Leader Goh Chok Tong Chiam See Tong Low Thia Khiang Party PAP SDA WP Leader's seat Marine Parade GRC Potong Pasir SMC Hougang SMC Last election 65.0%, 81 seats – 1 seat + 1 NCMP, 14.2% Seats won 82 1 + 1 NCMP 1 Seat change 1 New 1 NCMP Popular vote 470,765 75,248 19,060 Percentage 75.3% 12.0% 3.0% Swing 10.3pp New 11.2pp
Results by constituency
Prime Minister before election Goh Chok Tong PAP Prime Minister after election Goh Chok Tong PAP

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General elections were held in Singapore on 3 November 2001. President S.R. Nathan dissolved parliament on 18 October 2001 on the advice of Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong. The ruling People's Action Party (PAP) won 82 of the 84 elected seats in Parliament. Due to the large number (51) of uncontested seats, only 675,306 of the 2,036,923 eligible voters (33.2%) had an opportunity to vote. As of the recent election in 2020, this was the most recent, and fourth overall (third consecutive) election PAP returned to power on nomination day with a majority of uncontested walkovers. The election marked Goh Chok Tong's last election in which he led the party into a general election; his successor, Lee Hsien Loong, would succeed Goh on 12 August 2004.

Background[]

The ruling PAP's secretary-general and Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong initially scheduled for the election to be held in 2002, but pushed to November after Singapore faced an economic crisis due to the events of September 11 attacks in the United States.

For the first time since 1963, a formal political umbrella emerged from within the opposition. The four-party Singapore Democratic Alliance (SDA), which consist of the leader party Singapore People's Party (SPP), the National Solidarity Party (NSP), Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Singapura (PKMS) and Singapore Justice Party (SJP), was led by Chiam See Tong. SDA fielded the most candidates in the election, where NSP provided the bulk of nine candidates, SPP with four, and PKMS providing a required minority candidate.

Former Workers' Party (WP) Non-Constituency Member of Parliament Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam, who lost his seat after being declared a bankrupt owing to lawsuits by PAP leaders, resigned from the party, citing disagreements with the present leadership. The only WP Member of Parliament, Low Thia Khiang took over as secretary-general. During nomination day, WP was nominated on only two wards (Hougang and Nee Soon East SMC), as their sole GRC team who attempt to nominate in Aljunied Group Representation Constituency was disqualified for filing incomplete papers.

A seat had been vacated in 1999 after the conviction of Jalan Besar GRC's MP Choo Wee Khiang over commercial crimes, but no by-election was held as the seat was within a GRC. Under the law, an entire electoral constituency (for both single member and GRC seats) has to be vacated before a by-election could be called, as this was done during the Marine Parade GRC by-election of 1992.

Campaign[]

This election saw its shortest campaigning period of 17 days after opening of the register of electors, as well as the absence of four-member GRCs from the electoral map (four-member GRCs would reappear again in the 2011 elections, in nearly a decade later). Another increase of the election deposit amount this time was the most significant one in history, which almost doubled.

The end result saw WP's Low and SDA's Chiam retaining their seats, but saw their winning margins slashed from the 1997. With these two opposition wins, one NCMP seat was offered to and accepted by Steve Chia of Singapore Democratic Alliance, who became the youngest and first-ever non-WP NCMP.

Chee Soon Juan incident[]

Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) leader Chee Soon Juan came under fire in the media when he encountered Prime Minister Goh while campaigning at a hawker centre. He used a megaphone to ask Goh, "Where is the $18 billion that you have lent to (Indonesian President) Suharto?". Goh and Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew sued Chee for defamation shortly after the election.

Chee lost the lawsuits and was ordered to pay damages of S$300,000 to Goh and S$200,000 to Lee. On 10 February 2006, Chee was declared bankrupt by the High Court after failing to pay the damages owed to Goh and Lee, and was unable to stand in the elections held later May that year, until on 23 November 2012 where Chee was discharged from bankruptcy, and later returned to participate in the 2015 elections.

Timeline[]

Electoral boundaries[]

Outgoing/New MPs[]

There were a total of 40 (25 PAP) candidates making their political debut in the 2001 election. Among the new faces were Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Halimah Yacob who would later become future Senior Minister and President of Singapore, respectively. 24 incumbent MPs retired prior to the announcements. 15 candidates outside PAP were also new, among which new faces include Chee Siok Chin, sister of the SDP's leader Chee Soon Juan, as well as Desmond Lim, who would later lead the newly-formed SDA in future years, and a future Perennial candidate Ooi Boon Ewe.

Results[]

PAP won a landslide victory and its best result since 1980. The party achieved its third highest score among the general elections it has contested since 1959. The PAP's vote percentage of 75.3% signalled an overwhelming endorsement of the PAP to lead the nation out of the crisis that came at a time of great uncertainty over world security and the recession that came after the September 11 attacks.

Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
	People's Action Party	470,765	75.29	82	+1
	Singapore Democratic Alliance	75,248	12.03	1	0
	Singapore Democratic Party	50,607	8.09	0	0
	Workers' Party	19,060	3.05	1	0
	Democratic Progressive Party	5,334	0.85	0	0
	Independents	4,253	0.68	0	0
Total		625,267	100.00	84	+1
Valid votes		625,267	97.87
Invalid/blank votes		13,636	2.13
Total votes		638,903	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		2,036,923	31.37
Source: Singapore Elections[a]

By constituency[]

Constituency	Seats	Electorate	Turnout	%	Party		Candidates	Votes	%
Aljunied GRC	5	125,115	No election			People's Action Party	Ong Seh Hong Cynthia Phua Yeo Guat Kwang George Yeo Zainul Abidin Bin Mohamed Rasheed	Uncontested walkover
Ang Mo Kio GRC	6	166,644	No election			People's Action Party	Inderjit Singh Lee Hsien Loong Sadasivan Balaji Seng Han Thong Tan Boon Wan Wee Siew Kim	Uncontested walkover
Ayer Rajah SMC	1	18,475	17,420	94.29		People's Action Party	Tan Cheng Bock	15,024	87.96%
						Democratic Progressive Party	Tan Lead Shake	2,057	12.04%
Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC	5	114,621	No election			People's Action Party	Davinder Singh Leong Horn Kee Ng Eng Hen Wong Kan Seng Zainudin Nordin	Uncontested walkover
Bukit Timah SMC	1	26,951	25,215	93.56		People's Action Party	Wang Kai Yuen	19,121	77.37%
						Singapore Democratic Alliance	Tong Meng Chye	4,376	17.71%
						Independent	Tan Kim Chuang	1,215	4.92%
Chua Chu Kang SMC	1	24,863	23,936	96.27		People's Action Party	Low Seow Chay	15,349	65.34%
						Singapore Democratic Alliance	Steve Chia[b]	8,143	34.66%
East Coast GRC	6	144,012	No election			People's Action Party	Abdullah Tarmugi Chew Heng Ching Lee Yock Suan Raymond Lim S Jayakumar Tan Soo Khoon	Uncontested walkover
Holland-Bukit Panjang GRC	5	118,834	No election			People's Action Party	Gan Kim Yong Lim Swee Say Teo Ho Pin Vivian Balakrishnan	Uncontested walkover
Hong Kah GRC	5	129,073	123,749	95.88		People's Action Party	Ahmad Khalis Abdul Ghani Ang Mong Seng John Chen Amy Khor Yeo Cheow Tong	96,450	79.74%
						Singapore Democratic Party	Cheo Chai Chen Lim Boon Heng Lim Tung Hee Sarry Bin Hassan Wong Hong Toy	24,513	20.26%
Hougang SMC	1	23,320	22,247	95.40		Workers' Party	Low Thia Khiang	12,070	54.98%
						People's Action Party	Eric Low	9,882	45.02%
Jalan Besar GRC	5	100,268	93,451	93.20		People's Action Party	Heng Chee How Lee Boon Yang Loh Meng See Lily Neo Yaacob Ibrahim	68,309	74.48%
						Singapore Democratic Alliance	Fong Chin Leong Lim Bak Chuan Mohd Rahizan Bin Yaacob Ng Kee How Sin Kek Tong	23,391	25.51%
Joo Chiat SMC	1	21,745	19,049	87.60		People's Action Party	Chan Soo Sen	15,426	83.55%
						Independent	Ooi Boon Ewe	3,038	16.45
Jurong GRC	5	115,113	109,198	94.86		People's Action Party	Foo Yee Shoon Halimah Yacob Lim Boon Heng Ong Chit Chung Tharman Shanmugaratnam	84,742	79.75%
						Singapore Democratic Party	Chee Siok Chin Chee Soon Juan Karuppiah Ambalam Gandhi Mohamed Isa Bin Abdul Aziz Vincent Yeo	21,511	20.25%
MacPherson SMC	1	22,010	20,724	94.16		People's Action Party	Matthias Yao Chih	16,870	83.73%
						Democratic Progressive Party	Tan Soo Phuan	3,277	16.27%
Marine Parade GRC	6	140,174	No election			People's Action Party	Gan Lai Chiang Goh Chok Tong Mohamad Maidin bin Packer Mohd Othman Haron Eusofe R Ravindran Tan Hwee Hua	Uncontested walkover
Nee Soon Central SMC	1	22,975	21,836	95.04		People's Action Party	Ong Ah Heng	16,755	78.52%
						Singapore Democratic Party	Ling How Doong	4,583	21.48%
Nee Soon East SMC	1	28,465	26,969	94.74		People's Action Party	Ho Peng Kee	19,566	73.68%
						Workers' Party	Poh Lee Guan	6,990	26.32%
Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC	5	134,151	No election			People's Action Party	Ahmad Magad Charles Chong Michael Lim Penny Low Teo Chee Hean	Uncontested walkover
Potong Pasir SMC	1	16,616	15,630	94.07		Singapore Democratic Alliance	Chiam See Tong	8,107	52.43%
						People's Action Party	Sitoh Yih Pin	7,356	47.57%
Sembawang GRC	6	166,137	No election			People's Action Party	Chin Tet Yung Hawazi Daipi K. Shanmugam Warren Lee Mohd Maliki Osman Tony Tan	Uncontested walkover
Tampines GRC	5	125,432	119,479	95.25		People's Action Party	Mah Bow Tan Irene Ng Ong Kian Min Sin Boon Ann Yatiman B Yusof	85,915	73.34%
						Singapore Democratic Alliance	Abdul Rahim Bin Osman Foo Kok Wah Neo Ting Wei Sebastian Teo Yip Yew Weng	31,231	26.66%
Tanjong Pagar GRC	6	141,150	No election			People's Action Party	Chay Wai Chuen Chong Weng Chiew Indranee Thurai Rajah Khaw Boon Wan Koo Tsai Kee Lee Kuan Yew	Uncontested walkover
West Coast GRC	5	110,779	No election			People's Action Party	Fong Jen Arthur Foo Chee Keng Cedric Ho Geok Choo Madeleine Lim Hng Kiang S Iswaran	Uncontested walkover
Source: ELD

Notes[]

References[]

• "Hsien Loong: Election soon". (8 November 2005). New Straits Times, p. 31.

External links[]

• Singapore Elections Webpage