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The Presidential Elections Committee (PEC) is a six-member council set up by the Government of Singapore to ensure that each candidate running for the office of President of Singapore fulfils the stringent qualifications set out in Article 19 of the Constitution of Singapore.
The Presidential Elections Committee consists of:
There is also a Community Committee, which will assess whether the candidate belongs to the specified ethnic community. [2]
Legal academic Valentine Winslow wrote that the committee has the power to reject anyone who does not have "integrity, good character, and reputation", and that this places too much discretionary power in the hands of a small group of persons, with no guarantee that they are qualified to judge others as being of integrity and good character, or are unbiased, as there is no provision for any independent election commission. [3]
Constitutional lawyer Thio Li-ann wrote that the mechanism of selecting qualified candidates "removes the power of choice one step further away from the people, placing in the hands of an unelected group of people the power to decide who is a suitable candidate". [4]
Thio observed that the committee is "not under a legal duty to give reasons for their decision, which is deficient as a process". [4]
Winslow suggested that there is an "embarrassment of uncertainty" for a candidate seeking nomination, because they may be rejected for reasons completely unclear to them, and that "men of eminence" will not agree to be nominated if they are likely to be humiliated by rejection. [3]
The Presidential Elections Committee for the 2023 presidential election comprises six members. They are:
The Community Committee is headed by Edward D'Silva, a member of the Public Service Commission.
The Presidential Elections Committee for the 2017 presidential election comprises six members. They are:
The Community Committee is headed by Timothy James de Souza, a member of the Presidential Council of Minority Rights.
The Malay community sub-committee, which will issue the Malay Community Certificate to candidates, comprises five members. [5] They are:
All five were also on the Malay Community Committee that gave the green light to Malay candidates in Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs) in the 2015 general election. [6]
The Presidential Elections Committee for the 2005 Singapore presidential election had three members:
The president of the Republic of Singapore is the head of state of Singapore. The president represents the country in official diplomatic functions and possesses certain executive powers over the Government of Singapore, including the control of the national reserves and the ability to revoke and appoint public service appointments. The president also holds the prerogative to grant pardons.
The Government of Singapore is defined by the Constitution of Singapore to mean the executive branch of the state, the Republic of Singapore, which is made up of the president and the Cabinet. Although the president acts in their personal discretion in the exercise of certain functions as a check on the Cabinet and the Parliament, their role is largely ceremonial. It is the Cabinet, composed of the prime minister and other ministers appointed on their advice by the president, that have the general direction and control of the government. The Cabinet is formed by the political party that gains a simple majority in each general election.
The Parliament of Singapore is the unicameral legislature of the Republic of Singapore, which governs the country alongside the president of Singapore. Largely based upon the Westminster system, the Parliament is made up of Members of Parliament (MPs) who are elected, as well as Non-constituency Members of Parliament (NCMPs) and Nominated Members of Parliament (NMPs) who are appointed. Following the 2020 general election, 93 MPs and two NCMPs from three political parties were elected to the 14th Parliament. Throughout the sitting of Parliament, nine NMPs are usually appointed by the president on a biennial basis.
The Presidential Council for Minority Rights (PCMR) is a non-elected government body in Singapore established in 1970, the main function of which is to scrutinize most of the bills passed by Parliament to ensure that they do not discriminate against any racial or religious community. If the Council feels that any provision in a bill amounts to a differentiating measure, it will report its findings to Parliament and refer the bill back to Parliament for reconsideration. The council also examines subsidiary legislation and statutes in force on 9 January 1970. One member of the PCMR is nominated by the chairman to the Presidential Elections Committee, which is empowered to ensure that candidates for the office of President have the qualifications required by the Constitution. The President also appoints and dismisses the chairman and members of the Presidential Council for Religious Harmony ("PCRH"), established by the Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, on the advice of the PCMR, and the PCMR is responsible for determining whether PCRH members who are not representatives of major religions in Singapore have distinguished themselves in public service or community relations in Singapore.
Chan Heng Chee is a Singaporean academic and diplomat who has been serving as Ambassador-at-Large at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs since 2012, Chairwoman of the National Arts Council and Member of the Presidential Council for Minority Rights. She had also served as Singapore Ambassador to the United States between 1996 and 2012.
Zainul Abidin bin Mohamed Rasheed is a Singaporean diplomat, former politician and journalist. A former member of the governing People's Action Party (PAP), he was the Member of Parliament (MP) representing Eunos ward of Aljunied GRC between 2001 and 2011 and Cheng San GRC representing Punggol East ward from 1997 to 2001.
Sha'ari bin Tadin was a Singaporean politician who was the first Member of Parliament (MP) of Malay descent who graduated from a university. He was highly regarded as Cikgu Sha'ari, which translate to "Teacher Sha'ari" in English, for his role as an educator.
A group representation constituency (GRC) is a type of electoral division or constituency in Singapore in which teams of candidates, instead of individual candidates, compete to be elected into Parliament as the Members of Parliament (MPs) for the constituency. The Government stated that the GRC scheme was primarily implemented to enshrine minority representation in Parliament: at least one of the MPs in a GRC must be a member of the Malay, Indian or another minority community of Singapore. In addition, it was economical for town councils, which manage public housing estates, to handle larger constituencies.
The powers of the president of Singapore are divided into those which the president may exercise at their own discretion, and those they must exercise in accordance with the advice of the Cabinet of Singapore or of a minister acting under the general authority of the Cabinet. In addition, the president is required to consult the Council of Presidential Advisers (CPA) when performing some of their functions. In other cases, the president may consult the CPA if they wish to but is not bound to do so.
Presidential elections in Singapore, in which the President of Singapore is directly elected by a popular vote, were introduced after a constitutional amendment made in 1991. Potential candidates for office must meet stringent qualifications set out in the Constitution. Certificates of Eligibility are issued by the Presidential Elections Committee (PEC). In particular, the PEC must assess that they are persons of integrity, good character and reputation; and if they have not previously held certain key government appointments or were the chief executives of profitable companies with shareholders' equity of an average of S$500 million for the most recent three years in that office, they must demonstrate to the PEC that they held a position of comparable seniority and responsibility in the public or private sector that has given them experience and ability in administering and managing financial affairs.
Halimah Yacob is a Singaporean politician and former lawyer who has been serving as the eighth president of Singapore since 2017. Prior to her presidency, she served as the speaker of Parliament between 2013 and 2017. She is the first female president in Singapore's history.
The Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act 1990 ("MRHA") is a Singapore statute which, according to its long title, provides for the maintenance of religious harmony, for the establishment of a Presidential Council for Religious Harmony ("PCRH"), and for matters connected therewith. The Act, which was passed on 9 November 1990 and came into force on 31 March 1992, empowers the Minister for Home Affairs to make a restraining order against a person who is in a position of authority in any religious group or institution if the Minister is satisfied that the person has committed or is attempting to commit any of the following acts: causing feelings of enmity, hatred, ill-will or hostility between different religious groups; or promoting a political cause, carrying out subversive activities, or exciting disaffection against the President or the Government under the guise of propagating or practising a religious belief. A restraining order may also be made against a person who incites, instigates or encourages any religious leader or any religious group or institution to commit the above acts; or a person who is not a religious leader who causes or attempts to cause feelings of enmity, hatred, ill-will or hostility between different religious groups. A restraining order made against a religious leader may direct that he or she must obtain the permission of the Minister before addressing members of any religious group or institution, assisting or contributing to religious publications, or holding office in the editorial board or committee of such publications. Breaching a restraining order is a criminal offence.
Singapore has a multi-party parliamentary system of representative democracy in which the President of Singapore is the head of state and the Prime Minister of Singapore is the head of government. Executive power is vested in the President and the Cabinet. Cabinet has the general direction and control of the government and is collectively responsible to the Parliament. There are three separate branches of government: the legislature, executive and judiciary.
The Separation of powers in Singapore is governed by Constitution of the Republic of Singapore, which splits the power to govern the country between three branches of government – the parliament, which makes laws; the executive, which executes them; and the judiciary, which enforces them. Each branch, while wielding legitimate power and being protected from external influences, is subject to a system of checks and balances by the other branches to prevent abuse of power. This Westminster constitutional model was inherited from the British during Singapore's colonial years.
By-elections in Singapore are elections held to fill seats in the Parliament of Singapore that fall vacant in between general elections, known as casual vacancies. In the past, the Government of Singapore took the position that the Prime Minister had discretion whether or not a by-election should be called to fill a casual vacancy in a Single Member Constituency, and could leave a parliamentary seat unfilled until the next general election. However, in the case of Vellama d/o Marie Muthu v. Attorney-General (2013), which arose from a vacancy in Hougang Single Member Constituency, the Court of Appeal held that the Constitution of Singapore obliges the Prime Minister to call a by-election unless a general election is going to be held in the near future. However, a by-election need only be called within a reasonable time, and the Prime Minister has the discretion to determine when it should be held.
Presidential elections were scheduled to be held in Singapore in 2017. The elections were reserved for candidates from the Malay community, who had not held the presidency since 1970.
General elections were held in Singapore on Friday, 10 July 2020 to elect 93 members to the Parliament of Singapore across 31 constituencies. Parliament was dissolved and the general election called by President Halimah Yacob on 23 June, on the advice of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. It elected members of parliament to the 14th Parliament of Singapore since Singapore's independence in 1965, using the first-past-the-post electoral system. Voting was mandatory for all Singaporeans who were aged 21 or above as of 1 March 2020.
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Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in Singapore by 13 September 2023 to elect the next president.
General elections are due to be held in Singapore no later than 23 November 2025 to determine the composition of the fifteenth Parliament. The elections will be the nineteenth in Singapore since 1948 and the fourteenth since independence.
