SINGAPORE, Aug 10 — The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) will start introducing its new candidates and its entire slate from the coming week, said its organising secretary Ng Eng Hen yesterday. 

“After the National Day weekend, we will begin our introduction of candidates. Not only new candidates, but we will actually tell residents in the GRCs (Group Representation Constituencies) and some SMCs (Single Member Constituencies) who all their candidates are,” he told reporters while on the sidelines of Toa Payoh East’s National Day Observance Ceremony, which was also attended by fellow Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC Member of Parliament (MP) Zainudin Nordin and new face Saktiandi Supaat, who is tipped as a possible replacement for Zainudin.

“We have decided to hold off until after National Day because we should focus on how Singapore got here, what it means to be going forward. But as I said, after National Day, it is not only the introduction of new candidates, but the entire slate,” said Dr Ng, adding that the announcements will be made after tomorrow.

Asked whether the Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC helmed by him would take the similar path of a few other GRCs, whose longtime MPs have announced their retirement during community events over the weekend, Dr Ng said they would wait until the Jubilee Weekend is over. “We wanted also to not let that occupy the entire National Day weekend,” said Dr Ng, who is also Defence Minister. “This weekend should really help us to focus on how much Singapore has achieved and how we want to continue to maintain it, so we decided to space it out.”

Saktiandi, 40, one of the PAP’s new faces in Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC, is head of foreign exchange research at Maybank and a father of three children. 

When asked about him standing in the election, Saktiandi would only say it is “up to the party to decide” and he is “helping out at the moment”, referring to his role in the party’s Meet the People Sessions in the GRC.

Zainudin said Saktiandi has been working the ground for three years now, and “all the residents know him”. “He’s a hardworking man, very grounded, so people talk to him … that’s the good thing about people with very open personalities. He’s a very people person, so the relationship (with residents) has been good,” said Zainudin. 

As to whether he is contesting in the next election, the three-term MP said: “We are all team players. At the end of the day, we want Singapore to be better. If the renewal and revitalisation of the team as a strategy is important, we must believe in it.”

While speaking to residents earlier, Dr Ng said if his team is re-elected, he would hold some of his Meet the People Sessions at Toa Payoh East, which is under Zainudin. Dr Ng currently looks after the Toa Payoh Central division. 

“I have a tenderness for the people here and they all know me,” he said. 

“I thought because there’s been a change in the adviser and MP every last five years, I will want to come back and stabilise this,” he said, dropping perhaps the biggest hint that Zainudin could be stepping down. Dr Ng had started out in the Toa Payoh East division back in 2001, when he first entered politics. — TODAY