Still party leader: why the WP continues to back Pritam Singh

**Natasha Ann Zachariah** (0:07)
Is Workers' Party Chief Pritam Singh invincible? Now, going into last Sunday's Special Carder Members Conference, there was talk of a leadership shakeup. But as it turned out, nothing changed. Mr. Singh is still the party's leader after the WP's inner circle voted to keep him in the position. The result is the latest episode in a long drawn-out affair that started in 2021 when former Sengkang jerasi MP Raeesah Khan first lied in parliament. Since then, Mr. Singh has been convicted of lying under oath to a parliamentary committee. He lost his appeal to the high court and he paid a $14,000 fine. Now, in January this year, he was removed as the leader of the opposition in parliament. Meanwhile, the WP formed its own disciplinary panel to see if Mr. Singh breached the party's constitution. It found that he did and the party's central executive committee issued him a formal letter of reprimand.
That's just the last five years in a nutshell. Now, after all that, what did Sunday's proceedings actually mean for the WP?
I'm Natasha, and welcome to another episode of The Usual Place, the podcast where we have real conversations about the headlines. Now, to help me answer all these questions that I have about the WP, I have my colleague Tham Yuen-C, who's back again. Now, you're a senior political correspondent at The Straits Times, and you've covered the WP for about a decade now, and you've covered last weekend's proceedings quite closely, so I want to ask you your thoughts about it. But our other guest on the couch today is Dr. Teo Kay Key, a senior research fellow at IPS Social Lab at the Institute of Policy Studies. Now, some of your research areas are in political and social attitudes, public opinion, and voting behavior, and you're also currently working on a long-running project about youth.
So thank you both for being here, and I want to start with the question I asked at the beginning, because after all the things that have happened to Pritam, he has come out quite strong, remaining as the party's chief. Yuen-C, is he invincible?

**Tham Yuen-C** (1:57)
If you mean, if by invincible, you mean that within the party, his position is quite strong, and that the people who maybe wanted to launch a challenge against him cannot challenge him in the near future, then I would say probably so.

**Teo Kay Key** (2:15)
Kay Key, do you agree? I think so, because after Sunday's results, it's quite clear he has a pretty strong support base in the party internally.
They are very clear in standing behind their leader publicly. So I think his standing is pretty strong.

**Tham Yuen-C** (2:34)
Okay.

**Natasha Ann Zachariah** (2:35)
So let's get into all of it, because a lot of people were expecting fireworks on Sunday. But because before Sunday's meeting, there was talk that some cutters would aim to unseat him. But in the end, it was kind of a bit anti-climatic.
One thing that came out was that the party's former chief, Lao Tia Keang, had quote unquote ended his support for Pritam, right? But right before the meeting, Lao told the media that he continued to support Pritam. So did his last-minute move actually kill any opposition from within the party? And maybe if he were seen as, if he would the anti-Pritam faction have a bit more sway?

**Tham Yuen-C** (3:09)
I mean, I believe that when he came out so unequivocally in support of Pritam, surely, you know, that there must have been some influence in what he said. And whatever doubts people might have had within the party or outside, you know, he put that to rest and he was surely supporting Pritam. So I would think that there must have been some effect, some signalling effect within the party.

**Natasha Ann Zachariah** (3:34)
But what happened between Sunday and the weeks before when there was a lot of talk, perhaps that maybe he didn't support Pritam?

**Tham Yuen-C** (3:43)
Yes, I think there was, well, maybe, I think there were some people in the party who believed that he might not have agreed with how Pritam handled the whole Raeesah Khan matter, that perhaps because of that, he might not support Pritam. I think there was some talk of that within the party. And so everyone was really watching to see what he might do. Yeah. And I guess eventually he came out to say that he would.
Also, I feel like the fact that he might or might not agree with what Pritam did might not also mean that he will surely, you know, vote against Pritam, because it's quite different considerations there. I mean, in this case, he also has to consider like maybe the vote of the party and whether there's anyone else suitable for the post. Yeah. So, I mean, Law knows what he thought we wouldn't know, but yeah, I feel like the decisions are a bit different.