GE2025: WP's Pritam Singh leads team with two new faces Fadli Fawzi, Kenneth Tiong against PAP in Aljunied GRC
Faisal, who made his political debut in 2011, will be leading WP's team of of four first-timers in Tampines GRC
The WP team for Aljunied GRC comprises Singh, who is Leader of the Opposition, two incumbents – party chair Sylvia Lim and Gerald Giam, as well as Fadli Fawzi and Kenneth Tiong.
Fadli, a lawyer, first contested as part of the WP's Marine Parade GRC team, whereas Kenneth Tiong, a first-timer, is an AI startup founder.
Ahead of Nomination Day, there had been speculation that one of WP's senior party leaders may strike out elsewhere, with Aljunied GRC now come to be seen as one of WP's stronghold.
Faisal's move mirrors that of former WP chief Low Thia Kiang, who ventured out of Hougang SMC after 20 years to contest in Aljunied GRC in GE2011.
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The PAP's team led by Chan Hui Yuh, who contested in the previous election, consists of four first-timers: company director Adrian Ang, managing director of an urban planning consultancy Daniel Liu, dental surgeon Faisal Abdul Aziz and unionist Jagathishwaran Rajo.
Meanwhile, WP's Dennis Tan, the incumbent at Hougang SMC, will defend his ward against PAP new face and lawyer Marshall Lim.
Both parties arrived at Poi Ching School, one of the nine Nomination Centres across Singapore, at shortly before 11am on Wednesday (Apr 23), flanked by supporters.
Both parties' candidacies were confirmed at 12.30pm, with no objections raised by any of the candidates.
Aljunied GRC became the first GRC to be won by the opposition in GE2011, when WP's historic victory unseated three political heavyweights in one fell swoop, including then-foreign affairs minister George Yeo.
The GRC has come to be seen as one of WP's two crown jewels, alongside Hougang SMC, which the party has held since 1991.
The PAP has not been able to reclaim the GRC despite coming very close in 2015, when WP scraped a victory with a much smaller margin – securing just 50.96 per cent of the votes. That year, all wards saw a big swing towards the ruling party as Singaporeans celebrated SG50 and mourned the death of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew.
However, WP bounced back by GE2020, held in the middle of a global pandemic, when they took a decisive 59.95 per cent of the votes. The party also won its second GRC — Sengkang GRC — the same year.
If elected, Tiong will replace former MP Leon Perera, who resigned in 2023 after his extramarital affair with fellow party member Nicole Seah was exposed.
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He said attacks on the nation's systems and infrastructure will impact how it does business, with Singapore having to relook its vendors and supply chains. Trust and confidence in Singapore as a whole can also be affected, he added. "Businesses may shy away if they are unsure about our systems - whether the systems are clean, resilient, safe," he said. Mr Shanmugam cited APT attacks in Ukraine that caused a power outage. He also cited a cyber attack on a South Korean telecommunications company in April 2025 that exposed the SIM data of nearly 27 million users and caused widespread concern in the country. "Singapore has been attacked as well. We are a relevant country geopolitically. We are a digital and data hub that connects the world," he said. "People want to get into our systems, to both influence us and threaten us." He highlighted some attacks from APT actors in Singapore that have been made public, but where the culprits were not named due to national security reasons. These include an incident in 2014 when the authorities detected a security breach in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' technology systems. Steps were taken to isolate the affected devices, and the networks were strengthened following the discovery. In what was the first sophisticated attack against universities here, NUS and NTU discovered intrusions in their networks in 2017. No classified data or student personal data was stolen. But the attackers were believed to have targeted the two institutions to steal government and research data. The universities were involved in government-linked projects for the defence, foreign affairs and transport sectors. Then in 2018, Singapore experienced its worst data breach involving the personal particulars of 1.5 million patients, including then Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. The attacker in the SingHealth breach was said to be persistent in its efforts to penetrate the network, bypass the security measures, and illegally access and exfiltrate data. The attacker is believed to have lurked in the healthcare group's network for at least nine months. Its mission: to access SingHealth's electronic medical records system, which is critical information infrastructure in Singapore. The unauthorised transfer of sensitive data took place in 2018. Most recently in 2024, about 2,700 devices in Singapore were discovered to have been infected after CSA took part in a cyber operation against a global botnet. APT hackers behind the botnet exploited poor cyber hygiene practices to infect devices, including baby monitors and internet routers. No critical information infrastructure was affected by the attack. Mr Shanmugam said Singapore has been and continues to be attacked by cyber threat actors. He cited a survey which showed that nearly 80 per cent of organisations in Singapore have experienced some form of cyber attack. At the event on July 18, CSA chief executive David Koh noted that cyberspace is contested, and that the agency is on the front line of this dynamic domain. "We will continue to be agile, to adapt to emerging threats, and to demonstrate our collective will and commitment to secure Singapore's cyberspace," he added. This article was first published in The Straits Times. Permission required for reproduction.
