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Jean Iau

A year since the dust settled on the Singapore general election, leadership resignations in two small opposition parties signal a period of post-poll recalibration after disappointing results.
The once-promising Progress Singapore Party (PSP), led by ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) defector Tan Cheng Bock, was dealt an “existential blow” on Monday, analysts say, following the resignations of two central executive committee members.
Stephanie Tan, 38, was a newcomer who ran in the election, while Samuel Lim, 31, was the youngest-ever member to be elected into the committee.
Also on Monday, People’s Power Party (PPP) announced its secretary general, Goh Meng Seng, had been replaced by William Lim Lian Chin. Goh had said he would step down after his team’s dismal showing in the four-way contest in the Tampines constituency.
“Leadership changes might be afoot given that it has been just over a year after the general election, and the various parties might be looking at how they want to position themselves for the next GE,” said Teo Kay Key, senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies.

Tan announced her exit on social media, saying: “It has been such a fulfilling journey and while I remain hopeful to continue contributing to Singapore, it will no longer be through PSP due to differences in opinion in the direction of the party.”
The lawyer, who lost in the Pioneer single-seat fight with 34.55 per cent of the vote, was widely touted as a future leader and a signal that the party, still closely linked to its 86-year-old founder, could attract young talent.
Sources within the PSP told This Week in Asia the party had seen four members of its central leadership either step down or resign from May to July, with Tan and Lim leaving after they disagreed with the bloc’s direction.
A PSP cadre member who spoke on condition of anonymity called the changes “nothing unusual”, saying: “After every GE there is the internal party exercise in diagnostic examination of why and how the party should move next.”
However, another cadre member said: “It’s very sad to see the party slowly crumbling right under the eyes of the founder, Dr Tan Cheng Bock … The PSP of 2019 and the PSP of 2026 are totally different.”
PSP was founded in 2019 by Tan, who was an MP for 26 years in Ayer Rajah with the ruling PAP.
The party made headlines in the lead-up to the 2020 general election with an endorsement from Lee Hsien Yang – the estranged brother of then prime minister Lee Hsien Loong. It came close to winning the West Coast group constituency, earning it two non-constituency MP spots in parliament for the best-performing loser.

Two months after a disappointing result in last May’s election, in which PSP’s “A team” garnered 40 per cent of the vote in West Coast, Tan stepped down as party chairman to make way for younger leadership.
A spokesman from PSP described the changes as leadership renewal. “Elections test political parties. The years between elections build them. Politics is measured in decades, not by the outcome of any single election,” he said.
Walid Jumblatt Abdullah, an associate professor of public policy at Nanyang Technological University, said Stephanie Tan’s departure was particularly significant.
“Stephanie was indeed supposed to represent the next generation of PSP, or maybe the renewal or rejuvenation of PSP. Whether that means the PSP no longer exists or it means it’s no longer a tier two party, but a tier three party. Either way, it’s an existential blow,” Walid said.
Rebranding needed
Losing younger members affected the party’s renewal narrative, said Nydia Ngiow, managing director at strategic advisory firm BowerGroupAsia.
“Having lost their [non-constituency MP] presence last year meant PSP no longer had an institutional platform or visible national voice, which further compounds the party’s challenges,” Ngiow said.
“Additionally, parties built around a founding personality face real difficulties when that figure recedes and PSP has not yet demonstrated a tangible second act beyond Tan Cheng Bock.”
PPP’s Goh, meanwhile, said on social media that he considered himself “no longer suitable to lead a political party in this new era whereby values are no longer the primary consideration of voters”.

The former Workers’ Party (WP) member also took responsibility for PPP’s showing at the election. His team received 0.43 per cent of the vote in a four-way contest in Tampines and lost its campaign deposit.
“The uncomfortable reality is that GE2025 did not expand the space for opposition voices generally,” Ngiow said. “Goh Meng Seng’s and Derrick Sim’s departures from PPP add to a broader picture of smaller opposition parties struggling to sustain momentum after a GE that consolidated gains squarely around the WP.”
She stressed that this did not mean the smaller parties had no role but that their path ahead was neither straightforward nor guaranteed. “Each will need to make a clear-eyed assessment of what space they can genuinely occupy rather than defaulting to an electoral cycle they are not sufficiently equipped to fight.”
Walid argued that the leadership changes were not directly related to the opposition vote consolidating around the WP, pointing out that there were still others such as the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) and Red Dot United.
The opposition was not a monolith, he said. “Given the situation now, that the WP plus SDP cannot possibly contest all the seats in Singapore … there will still be room for these smaller parties.”

Teo agreed that smaller opposition parties still had a part to play as the WP’s electoral success and strategy was concentrated in the east and northeast.
“The issue would be the parties’ ability to build up a recognisable party brand that is more than just certain individuals, gain public attention without parliamentary presence, and be consistent in their work on the ground in whichever regions they choose to be active in,” she said.
Parties needed to develop their own identities beyond one or two prominent figures, she added. “If not, even if those individuals manage to get some electoral success, it might not extend to the parties they belong to once they step out of politics.”


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Progress Singapore Party and People’s Power Party have been hit by leadership resignations after poor showings at last year’s poll


Progress Singapore Party and People’s Power Party have been hit by leadership resignations after poor showings at last year’s poll.


Changes underway in Singapore’s smaller opposition parties as leaders quit

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Progress Singapore Party and People’s Power Party have been hit by leadership resignations after poor showings at last year’s poll

Progress Singapore Party and People’s Power Party have been hit by leadership resignations after poor showings at last year’s poll