Tan See Leng’s exasperated rebuttal to Leong Mun Wai in Parliament yesterday was a sight to behold. The Minister for Manpower condemned Leong Mun Wai’s habit of demanding statistics that don’t exist, and his consistent disregard of statistics that do.
But the exchange exposes a problematic brand of politics that the PSP has introduced into Singapore’s civil society, a consistent disregard for facts.
Whether it’s his reliance on unverified, anonymous WhatsApp messages as “evidence” in Parliament or his baseless accusations of biased treatment by the Speaker in a podcast—an accusation he later had to retract and apologize for— factual accuracy seems to be an elastic quality for the PSP MP.
Leong Mun Wai has never let facts get in the way of a good story. When he posted on Facebook about a poor, mistreated elderly couple, he was so eager to accused government agencies of failing to support them, that he failed to check the veracity of his claims. It later emerged that this couple had been receiving government assistance for years.
When confronted with the facts, Leong was forced to backtrack, and the fallout from this incident led to his stepping down as PSP secretary-general. While some speculate that this was merely a smokescreen to conceal internal party strife, it’s undeniable that such a casual relationship with the truth undermines the credibility of the PSP and damage their ability to advocate meaningfully for Singaporeans.
The latest incident, where the PSP claims to have been harassed by People’s Action Party (PAP) activists during a walkabout, reeks of the same pattern.
Given the ample video evidence of PSP activists engaging in boorish behaviour during the 2020 General Elections, storming into coffeeshops, shouting party slogans right next to PAP MPs who were greeting residents, their accusations now appear suspect. If the PSP wishes to be taken seriously, they need to hold themselves to the same standards they demand of others.
The antics of the PSP increasingly resemble those of far-right, anti-immigrant parties in the West, such as Germany’s AfD, the UK’s Reform Party, or even Donald Trump’s Republican movement. These groups thrive on making outrageous claims, denying their own bad behaviour, attacking and reversing the roles of victim and offender. DARVO—the favourite weapon of choice for gaslighters. This is not the kind of politics Singapore deserves.
PSP’s theatrics are populist, anti-immigration, and rooted in rejecting facts and statistics in favor of emotional manipulation. If this pattern continues, it risks importing the anti-truth movement into Singapore, a path that leads to the end of rational politics. For a nation that prides itself on pragmatism and accountability, this would be a grave disservice to the Singaporean people.
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