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1/ Yes, the gerrymandering is a biggie—electoral boundaries change before every election (are there such major demographic shifts *every* time?) in ways that are not very logical (why is nex in Serangoon technically MARINE PARADE GRC?)
2/ We do not have an independent Elections Commission—ours reports to the Prime Minister’s Office. Considering the dominance of the People’s Action Party, the lack of an independent body is troubling.
3/ The prerogative of the PM to call the election is not unique to Singapore, but in our context it’s troubling. This is exacerbated by a short campaigning period (10 days)—it means the PAP knows when the election will be but other parties are kept uncertain and have to scramble.
4/ The GRC system, where candidates stand in teams instead of contesting in single constituencies, also tilts the playing field, making it harder for resource-strapped opposition parties to put teams together (+ pay the deposit for each candidate).
5/ The GRC system also means that when one seat is vacated, there is not necessarily a by-election, where there would have had to be if it were single member. See: what’s happened with Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC after Halimah stepped down (and then became President).
6/ The GRC system exacerbates first-past-the-post so we can have situations where the PAP got 60% of the popular vote but 81 out of 87 seats (2011) or 70% voteshare and 83 out of 89 seats (2015).
7/ And this is not even going into how there are other levers that make things unfair, such as how the People’s Association is a statutory board for grassroots outreach but widely seen as practically an arm of the PAP.
8/ For more on our elections and its history you should listen to @pjthum’s History of Singapore podcast, where he has a special episode on elections: m.soundcloud.com/historysg/spec…
