SINGAPORE, June 24 — Despite it being held in the "new normal”, Singapore political parties have hit the ground running for its July 10 General Election.

They are in "overdrive” to line up their candidates and campaign in the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, which Singapore took quite a hit but has managed to contain it.

As for the ruling party, the People’s Action Party (PAP), it picked today to name its first batch of new candidates.

Other political parties are also set to introduce their respective line ups from now on to about 2.6 million registered voters ahead of nomination day on June 30.

Limited by the Covid-19 situation, political parties are leveraging on social media platforms and other avenues such as the Zoom application to hold the introduction sessions.

The media fraternity here is on high alert as to when the sessions will be conducted by about 10 political parties in the fray.

The polls will see the election of 93 Members of Parliament (MPs), an increase from the previous 89 elected MPs.

The representatives will be for 14 Single Member Constituencies (SMCs) and 17 Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs).

The election campaign will be done while it is still mandatory to wear a mask in the city-state when stepping out of the house.

Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean shared a light moment on his Facebook page that two ladies didn’t recognise him with his mask on when he visited Punggol West recently.

However, Teo  said the ladies burst out laughing at the end when he introduced himself.

The republic Elections Department (ELD) has drawn up as set of preliminary campaigning guidelines by referring to Ministry of Health guidelines.

Under the current guidelines, among others, political parties and candidates are allowed to conduct walkabouts and door-to-door campaigning.

Any group doing the campaigning should be made up of not more than five persons, there should be no mixing between groups, and each group should remain at least one metre apart from other groups.

They are to take the necessary precautions, such as wearing masks, maintaining safe distancing, keeping all interactions and engagements transient, and minimising physical contact, such as refraining from shaking hands.

The same rules also apply to members of the media if they are present for such activities.

In the  2015 general election, PAP won 83 out of 89 seats, with the other six won by the Workers’ Party of Singapore. — Bernama