GE2020 explainer: What is an independent candidate?

Election season is when you see party banners with the faces of candidates hung on street lamps around your neighbourhood.

And while most election candidates are members of a political party, did you know that you can stand for election even if you are not affiliated to any party?

Termed independent candidates, individuals can choose to contest in an SMC or together with other independent candidates in a GRC, and if they win, they will become elected MPs in Parliament. 

So why don’t they join a party as it must surely be easier?

Party candidates have the advantage of an established party brand name. They also have organisational and logistical assistance, as well as the backing of popular political leaders in the party.

Speaking to Today, Singapore Management University law don Eugene Tan shared, “There will always be people who want to contest in elections for whatever reason, and on their own terms, so there will be independent candidates”.

He added that people who do not fit under the Opposition and are not supportive of the People’s Action Party (PAP) might emerge as independent candidates.

We delve more into independent candidates and how they have fared at past elections. 

How have independent candidates fared in the past?

In short, Singapore has had elected leaders who did not belong to any political party. Just not since 1965.

In the 1955 election, three independent candidates were elected into the Legislative Assembly (now known as Singapore’s Parliament) and in the 1959 election, there was one successful independent candidate. 

In the last general election, there were two independent candidates and both failed to get elected into Parliament.

What happens if an independent candidate is not elected? 

All candidates, affiliated to parties or not, are subject to the same terms. Hence, if an independent candidate fails to get at least 12.5 per cent of the votes in the constituency they are contesting in, they will forfeit their election deposit — the sum of money they have to put down to stand for election.

For the 2020 general election, the election deposit is $13,500. 

The sum is equal to the fixed monthly allowance payable to an elected MP the month immediately before Parliament is dissolved, rounded to the nearest $500. And it is $1,000 less than the 2015 election.  

Who are some notable independent candidates of elections past?

1. Best performing candidate

Ahmad Ibrahim is the best performing independent candidate at any general election. Contesting against Lee Kim Kee from the Progressive Party for the Sembawang ward in 1955, he won with 4,281 votes or 63.24 per cent of the total votes. 

Ahmad later went on to join PAP and was their first Malay minister serving as the Minister of Health in 1959. 

There are two schools, one road and a mosque in Yishun named after him in Singapore.

2. Singapore’s first Speaker of Parliament 

Arumugam Ponnu Rajah won against four other candidates as an independent candidate for the Farrer Park ward in the 1959 election.

Though he lost his seat in 1963, he became the first Speaker of Parliament in 1965. In 1966, he became Singapore’s first High Commissioner to Britain.

Rajah is also the first Supreme Court judge in Singapore to remain on the bench after turning 70.

3. Independent candidate turned Workers’ Party member

MPD Nair was a veteran politician who won as an independent candidate in the 1955 election in the Seletar ward.

He then failed to get re-elected at subsequent elections and eventually joined the Workers’ Party in 1972. 

In 1984, he was offered a non-constituency seat in Parliament, which was introduced that year for the best-performing losers in the Opposition, but he did not take it up.

4. First female independent candidate 

Blogger and activist Han Hui Hui is the first female independent candidate to ever stand for election. She was also the youngest candidate in the 2015 election but failed to be elected.

She wrote in her Facebook post that she was the only post-1990 independent candidate to break the single digit mark, with the 10 per cent share of the total votes she had garnered in Radin Mas SMC.

Are you a first time voter or perhaps just not all too familiar with what happens during a general election? Click here to read everything you need to know about GE2020.

trining@asiaone.com