Chance to see S'pore without its make-up

Polls are real national drama as their intensity makes it hard to keep up pretences

By Zuraidah Ibrahim, The Straits Times, 20 Jan 2013

Despite talk of contest fatigue, to me, there is no better time to be a journalist than during elections.

It is a chance to see your country without its make-up on. While every party tries to stage-manage its appearances, the intensity of the campaign makes it impossible to keep up pretences. Weary candidates reveal quirks of personality, while the voters they are trying to woo do not bother to be anything other than themselves. The result, every time, is an authentic national drama.

Just weeks after I became a political reporter, there was the 1988 General Election and I've covered every one since, including the one before us in Punggol East. Singaporeans are more swept up by polls these days, now that there are fewer walkovers and results are harder to predict. But the truth is that, even in the old normal, there was nothing ordinary about elections when you looked at them up close.

While much has changed, there remain some immutables.

One constant is that opposition politicians are wired differently - especially from the ruling party but also from one another. As a group, it is a wonder that they are so committed to a cause so high on risk and so remote in rewards. They do not come from just one mould. Their characteristics range from idealism and selfless dedication to impetuousness, overarching egotism, and, in a few cases, touches of insanity.

Their appeal also varies. In 1988, as the rookie in the team covering the closely fought Eunos GRC election, I didn't have much to do except hold up a tape recorder and listen. I remember being amazed at how Workers' Party candidate Francis Seow in his double-breasted suit with glinting buttons kept a working-class crowd agog despite his posh accent and flowery sentence structures.

In contrast, when I met one Mr Low Thia Khiang at his Defu Lane workshop, there was little to suggest that this teacher-turned-contractor would inherit the party of the leonine David Marshall and J.B. Jeyaretnam. But there was no denying his passion and political acumen. Crouched in his seat, speaking in broken English but thoughts clearly formed, he talked about the closure of Nantah and teaching low-income students, and his determination to serve as a check on the Government's power.

When Dr Chee Soon Juan arrived, he was introduced to the media by a pleased-as-punch Mr Chiam See Tong inside his cramped Potong Pasir Town Council office. Asked what he knew about politics, Dr Chee said humbly he had no qualifications and then betrayed himself: "Just a good brain and a strong heart."

Whether it was Dr Lee Siew Choh or Mr Jeyaretnam who used to bellow at us whenever he heard the name of our newspaper or the zany Mr Harbans Singh who served champagne at his press conferences, they marched to a different tune. Their contributions might not be measured in iconic projects or brilliant policy moves, but they came out every few years to prick our conscience, challenge our assumptions or just claim their 15 minutes of fame.

A second constant is the PAP's dilemma of how to dominate an election without alienating voters. The old PAP in attack mode did not believe in half measures. On the campaign rounds, Mr Lee Kuan Yew would stare at you with narrowed eyes and thunder about how opposition-led town councils would lead to your rubbish chutes being choked a few floors high.

In 2001, after Dr Chee heckled then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong at a walkabout, I asked Mr Lee how he would have acted if he had been in Mr Goh's shoes. "I will leave that to your imagination," he said, and sat back, while the crowd roared. He added later: "As I've told you many times, I was brought up fighting communists in the streets. If Dr Chee tried that with me, you just think what would have happened."

The PAP's challenge is knowing when to turn up the heat, but also when to turn it down. Often, it failed to serve the porridge just right, leaving an uneasy taste in people's mouths. Its accusations against Dr James Gomez in 2006 and Mr Tang Liang Hong in 1997 probably went overboard.

It was more restrained in 2011 - but the disappointing outcome might make some insiders wonder whether it has become too tentative and soft. Fortunately, the party seems to have reconciled itself to the fact that the public has changed and will not accept a return to old-style tactics. But striking the right balance - being a party that means business and not one that is just mean - remains a tricky one.

Third, the X-factor that will be decisive in a close election is always a mystery. In 1991, I hung out at Bukit Gombak a fair bit, trailing both the PAP incumbent Seet Ai Mee and the Singapore Democratic Party's Mr Ling How Doong. Dr Seet was a dynamo, obviously capable and committed. Mr Ling struck me as someone who'd be more at home in a karaoke bar than in Parliament. But he could turn on an avuncular charm that became a counterpoint to her chop-chop air of impatience. That year, Singapore traded its only woman minister for a man who went on to be a one-term MP (although once, it did seem like he confused the House for a bar when he uttered vulgarities in the Chamber).

Mr Chiam was another who benefited electorally from high likeability. Behind the scenes, he was far less easy-going, which is partly why the parties he led remained small. But try telling that to the legions of his fans, for whom the former Potong Pasir MP could do no wrong.

Pundits can analyse the demographics and national indicators all they like and commentators can opine about what would be good for the country, but ultimately the verdict belongs only to the voters - for better or worse.

That, as well, is part of the challenge of covering elections. There is nothing like a morning walk on a weekend with a candidate to meet Singaporeans in varying states of dress and undress, as they have their breakfast in coffee shops gleaming or grimy. Along residential streets cradling big houses, candidates are greeted by disembodied voices through intercoms. On common corridors, the entourage peers through latticed grilles at families lounging in the sanctuary of home.

Through these visits, rallies and press conferences, the candidates collectively produce their narratives of what is going wrong or right in society and what they plan to do about it. It forms a running commentary of our concerns and hopes for the place we call home. And it offers stark choices for the electorate.

An election is a serious exercise in political participation. As journalists, it is a challenge to keep the country focused on issues that matter, and not get distracted by the inevitable fireworks that will be lit by all sides.

The people will have the last word. But - as this is the alleged "emotionless" Singaporean we are talking about - the people are hard to read.

Multiple meanings will be read and post-mortems will be held into what they eventually said with their vote. And then political life moves on to another phase, one hopes, a better one.