General Elections 2011 Singapore

Perhaps one of the most exciting and exhilarating events that has happened in Singapore recently could be the General Elections 2011. A general election in Singapore is held every half a decade, but what is so special about this particular year's elections?

The general elections this year is one of the most action-packed elections mainly because of the sudden and massive increase of opposition parties contesting. Out of the 87 seats in parliament, 82 were contested, the most ever. In previous elections, many GRCs and SMCs were walkovers due to the fact that there were few opposition parties and there was no contest. As a result, the public has hardly got a chance to vote in elections. But now that almost every part of Singapore is contested, many people are excited at the chance to vote and try and make a change for Singapore.

One of the other differences with the previous elections is the use of social networking and media. Now that many websites have come on like Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter and many more, even politicians are using these to communicate with the public, and especially the young adults who are more actively into this. As a result of using these websites though, the parties are able to reach out to more people and thus can secure a bit more voters this way.

In my opinion, i think that the opposition, although most may not get into parliament, has made the PAP work for their place in parliament instead of just the timely walkovers, and has forced the PAP candidates to make an effort to improve resident's lives and not just thank the public for the walkovers. Although the PAP is still the dominant party, having a different say in parliament is beneficial as there will be people to oppose decisions made and to let people think about the policies and schemes etc.

I look forward to this elections as many hopes are up for the opposition to take control of this election, yet the PAP may still have a strong hold on this elections.