SINGAPORE, July 14 — Progress Singapore Party (PSP) assistant secretary-general Leong Mun Wai and vice-chairman Hazel Poa will take up the Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) seats offered to the party following the General Election, the party said today.

PSP secretary-general Tan Cheng Bock announced his party’s choices for the posts at a press conference at the party’s headquarters in Bukit Timah Shopping Centre.

Dr Tan said that his party had accepted the Elections Department’s offer and it is "official now”. "Both of them will be your NCMPs,” he said.

The announcement means that Dr Tan, 80, will pass on the opportunity to re-enter Parliament to make way for his younger teammates.

Throughout the campaign, the former People’s Action Party (PAP) Member of Parliament (MP) of 26 years had said repeatedly that he would not take up an NCMP seat, as he had already had his time in Parliament as an elected MP.

Leong, 60, had also told reporters during the campaign that he would not want to take up an NCMP position, but noted that he would defer to Dr Tan on the matter.

Asked again on Sunday after the conclusion of the polls, Leong would only say that it "depends on the party”.

PSP’s choices for the NCMP seats — Leong and Poa, 50 — are former government scholars who contested the West Coast Group Representation Constituency (GRC) in the July 10 General Election (GE).

Mr Leong was also the former managing director of OCBC Securities and is now the chief executive officer of investment firm Timbre Capital.

Ms Poa, who had worked at the Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministry of Finance, runs an education business with five centres and a private school. She was previously with the National Solidarity Party and the Reform Party.

PSP’s West Coast team emerged as the "best-performing losers” in the GE, garnering 48.31 per cent of the vote against the PAP.

The NCMP scheme grants seats to losing opposition candidates with the highest percentage of votes to guarantee at least 12 opposition MPs in the House.

There will be two NCMPs this time around, as 10 members from the Workers’ Party (WP) were elected.

The other members in PSP’s West Coast team are adult educator Nadarajah Loganathan, 57, and marketing executive Jeffrey Khoo, 51.