Singapore’s transport minister, S. Iswaran, was arrested last week on corruption charges: it was the first corruption case involving a minister in the country’s 40-year history. Two MPs also resigned on Monday after it was revealed that they had had affairs with married people, violating the strict codes of conduct imposed on members of the Popular Action Party (PAP), which has been in government continuously since 1965. The two are Tan Chuan-Jin, speaker of parliament (54, married, who in the past had also been listed as a possible prime minister) and Cheng Li Hui (47, single).
The news was picked up a lot in Singapore, where similar scandals are very rare, especially within the Pap. Now several commentators are wondering if these two stories could have consequences on the control that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong exercises over the party and on the popular consensus towards the Pope, who today enjoys a large majority in parliament.
Hotel entrepreneur Ong Beng Seng was also arrested as part of the same investigation that led to the arrest of the Minister of Transport. In the past the minister had had various relationships with Ong: for example the two they had contributed at the establishment of the Singapore Formula 1 Grand Prix in 2008. For now, no other information has been made public: the only thing known is that both were arrested on corruption charges, and that Ong was released on payment of a 68 thousand euro bail.
From left: Former Singapore Sports Hub chief executive Lionel Yeo, former transport minister S. Iswaran, former Formula 1 president and chief executive Chase Carey and entrepreneur Ong Beng Seng during a press conference for the Singapore round of Formula 1 in September 2017 (Photo by Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
The People’s Action Party has always been at the center of Singaporean politics, and it was even after 1965, that is, when Singapore was expelled from the Federation of Malaysia over both political and economic disagreements with the Malaysian central government. Among the founders of the party there was also Lee Kuan Yew, father of the current prime minister and in turn head of government until 1990: Lee Kuan Yew is still highly regarded today because he is recognized as the political leader who brought prosperity to Singapore.
The scandals within the Pap are considered so serious because the party has always built part of its reputation on the principle of “honesty” required of its members, which is still fundamental today. After each election it is customary for the prime minister to send one letter to its parliamentarians in which it illustrates the code of conduct requested of them: “integrity, honesty and incorruptibility” are the necessary prerequisites.
The rules have been established to preserve the reputation of the Pap, but also because in Singapore they do not exist solid systems of supervision of the various powers of the state. The system is in fact based on the trust that citizens have in the political class, which must prove itself worthy of remaining in government by guaranteeing efficiency and honesty. Furthermore, the generous allowances received by parliamentarians and members of the government must be justified: they are among the highest in the world, and in the past they had also been reduced precisely as a result of some strong controversies by the opposition.
It is also the very high salaries of civil servants that explain why corruption in Singapore is so rare and dishonorable. For ministers the basic allowance is 715 thousand S$ (Singapore dollars) per year, which equals 483,000 euros. Thanks to the many bonuses, often, the annual salary exceeds one million Singapore dollars, 680 thousand euros. MPs, on the other hand, receive an allowance of over S$ 192,000, approximately 130,000 euros. According to Corruption Perceptions Indexan annual study published by the NGO Transparency International that ranks countries according to the level of perceived corruption, Singapore is the fifth least corrupt country in the world.
Former Speaker of the Singapore Parliament Tan Chuan-Jin (Photo by Yong Teck Lim/Getty Images)
There is also another thing to consider: for a series of institutional reasons, opposing Singapore is very difficult. Each candidate who wants to stand for election must pay a sum that corresponds to the last indemnity paid to the elected members of parliament at that time in parliament, rounded up to the nearest $500: for the 2020 elections it was necessary to pay S$13,500, around 9,200 euros. In case of defeat, the sum is not returned. In some constituencies, then, each party is obliged to present four or five candidates (therefore to pay a lot of money), and considering the electoral system, in which whoever wins in the constituency wins all the seats, often for opposition parties to present many candidates becomes not advantageous.
The geographical definition of Singapore’s constituencies itself is not carried out by an independent body, and is dealt with by some agencies that answer directly to the prime minister. For this reason, the government has been accused several times in the past of practicing the gerrymanderingthat is, to manipulate the geographical boundaries of constituencies close to elections to secure an advantage.
The Constitution then provides for various cases in which it is possible to limit freedom of expression, an instrument to which the parliament has repeatedly resorted. In 2019, the government passed a controversial law allowing it to remove online content it deems false.
The last time a Singaporean politician was embroiled in a corruption scandal was in 1986, when then Minister for National Development, Teh Cheang Wan, was arrested on charges of accepting bribes in exchange for the sale of state-owned land. Teh Cheang Wan committed suicide in prison later that year, before the trial began, leaving a letter addressed to Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew apologizing for his conduct.
Since 2018, the “passage to the fourth generation” has been underway in the Pap, which provides for the renewal of politicians in the main government posts. Lawrence Wong, the current finance minister, is Lee’s most likely successor as prime minister at the moment. In April 2022 he had been selected by the party leadership as leader of the “4G team” for the transition to the new generation of Pope politicians. In June of the same year he was appointed deputy prime minister, a position he still holds. In Singapore, the next political elections will be in 2025, but it is not yet clear whether Lee will give up his place or if he will run again as prime minister.
