GE2025: This concerned parent's search for answers got her to this election as WP's Punggol GRC candidate

CNA

24-04-2025

If I had to sum up 43-year-old Siti Alia Mattar Abdul Rahim Mattar in one sentence, it would be this: She's a mother through and through.
Enter her home and you'll find her children's pictures decorating the walls and a bookshelf mostly filled with books for teenagers and children. The living room in her executive flat in Tampines has two large couches, perfect for hosting large families and for children to play around.
Then there's Ms Alia herself, with her warm and nurturing air, regularly bringing up her children throughout our 90-minute conversation, which started off with me noticing in shock that she had come armed with a printed copy of the Worker's Party (WP) 122-page manifesto.
"I prefer it on paper, I'm old-school," the lawyer said, adding that her personality type is ISTJ.
It is one of 16 personality types under the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which supposedly means that she is someone who is organised and highly structured, quite apt for a full-time working mother who also runs a three-children household.
So it came as no surprise to learn that her children were the catalyst that led to her becoming a Workers' Party (WP) candidate for Punggol Group Representation Constituency (GRC) in this election.
"I'm excited to be in Punggol with a strong team," she told me after finishing her maiden speech at a WP rally in Sengkang on Thursday (Apr 24) night.
"We hope the residents of Punggol see the good work that our party has put in for constituencies like Sengkang, Hougang and Aljunied, and see that the party has a proven track record there that we intend to take over to Punggol if elected."
She was too tired to speak more, off from the high of rallying thousands in the crowd and hundreds of thousands more online to vote for her and the party.
Alongside fellow new faces – Senior Counsel Harpreet Singh, Ms Alexis Dang and Mr Jackson Au – she will be contesting against the other four-member team from the People's Action Party (PAP) comprising Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong, Senior Minister of State Janil Puthucheary and Senior Minister of State Sun Xueling, as well as Ms Yeo Wan Ling.
GETTING INTO POLITICS
Ms Alia's venture into politics started fairly recently in early 2024.
She told me earlier on Monday that it all began when her daughter told her about a Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) lesson in school where the war in Gaza was the topic.
As her 12-year-old daughter reported what she had learnt, Ms Alia became increasingly concerned about what she was hearing – not only did she find the lesson materials to be objectionable, she was also alarmed that parents had not been told beforehand that their children would be learning about such a sensitive topic in school.
"I thought that the topic was sensitive enough, equivalent to like sexuality education, where parents are allowed to opt out for their children," Ms Alia said.
She then approached the school and her MP at a Meet-The-People Session to raise her concerns about the matter.
"I asked my MP, 'Can you bring it up in parliament?' And the response that he gave was not convincing to me," she said.
So, she decided to head to then Aljunied GRC MP Faisal Manap's Meet-The-People Session.
After that, she heard that the WP MPs had raised the matter in parliament.
The CCE lesson had sparked a debate online over what schools are teaching students about the conflict in Gaza. Eventually, Education Minister Chan Chun Sing addressed the matter in parliament on Mar 4 last year.
In the speech, Mr Chan said that the lesson was to help students understand what is going on, express their own views and manage their own emotions; appreciate diverse perspectives sensitively and respectfully; discern information from different sources, and play their part to support racial harmony and social cohesion.
He added that the lesson does not tell students whether any party is good or evil, does not impose any particular perspective or interpretation of events.
"It most certainly does not create a wedge between our students' religious beliefs and their national identity. It is also not meant to bring other people's politics into our schools," Mr Chan said then.
For Ms Alia, the whole debate left a deep impression, mainly that the WP MPs had been responsive to ground feedback and given people like her a voice in parliament. Soon after, that same month in March, she signed up to be a WP volunteer.
"I thought that this is the kind of representation that we need from elected officials."
As a volunteer, she spent several days a week doing house visits and helping out at a handful of Meet-The-People Sessions with WP's secretary-general Pritam Singh.
Though she has been walking the ground for just less than a year, Ms Alia said that the experience has been eye-opening.
"People are welcoming, they are so keen to talk about ... whatever issues they are facing. You realise that there are many issues that are underlying in society that need to be brought up," she said.
She added that some common matters raised by residents included concerns about the cost of living, healthcare expenses, as well as housing affordability and availability.
With more time spent away from home, it was tough for her children to accept this new reality.
She said that her 12-year-old daughter, the youngest of the three, bawled at first. Her other two children are aged 18 and 15.
"But I said, 'Look, we've to think beyond ourselves.' And when I go home and I share with them stories, they're very keen to know what's going on," Ms Alia said, adding she was proud of them that they were showing concern for others.
And in her relatively short time as a volunteer, Ms Alia's dedication impressed the opposition party enough that the party leaders asked her to become a candidate "not too long ago".
She had her doubts at first, but her husband convinced her to take the leap.
"When I was first approached, I discussed it first with my husband and he said, 'You can achieve so much more'," she said, adding that she decided to be a candidate after talking to him.
"I cannot say that I need more representation in parliament and then just say, 'Okay, no, but not me'.
"If I want more representation, then I have to be willing and able to step up and also, you know, offer my services as well."
FATHER'S INFLUENCE
Ms Alia is the third of four siblings, while her father is one of 12.
"I saw my dad looking after his dad, taking turns with his siblings. But towards the end, I could see that my dad spent a lot of time trying to look after his dad," she said.
Her father had also taken care of her mother as she battled Parkinson's disease. She died nine years ago.
"I would say that my dad – looking at how he was in terms of how well he looked after the people around him – he's shaped a very big part of my life," she said.
Now she and her siblings take turns to care for their father, who has several chronic conditions and kidney failure.
While caring for her children and father is not something she considers a burden, but rather a joy, she said that more could be done to support people such as herself in the "sandwiched generation".
This includes removing the limits on the Central Provident Fund's Medisave account so that senior citizens do not need to pay as much out of pocket for medical treatments – a proposal in WP's manifesto that she hopes to raise in parliament, alongside other proposals.
What about the fact, though, that she would have to sacrifice even more family time if she is elected as MP?
Without hesitation, she said: "I do know that as an elected official, your constituents will come first. That's something I'll have to think about when we get to that point."
"They knows that and they understand that there is a significance to what I want to do, what I'm pursuing," she said, referring to her family.
"Nothing good comes without sacrifice."
"I'M QUITE A BORING PERSON"
Indeed, Ms Alia easily handled all the tough questions I threw her way, until we got to this one: What are your hobbies?
"I'm quite a boring person," she said with a laugh. "These days, all I am thinking about are policies and changes, like, what can we do better?"
After more probing, I got the sense that she was not one to pick up a leisure activity that did not have a productive purpose.
For example, she reads Islamic history books because "reading has to be beyond my immediate pleasures ... it has to be something that is for the long term".
She also recently signed up for a gym membership, because she hopes to join a Hyrox competition someday, though she says that day is nowhere near yet.
Hyrox is a timed race where participants run and complete functional exercises.
When I asked about the highlight of her life so far, she said that it has been watching her children grow.
Motherhood aside, what about her own achievements as an individual? Again, Ms Alia struggled to find an answer.
Finally, after much thought, she laughed sheepishly and said, "I can't think of anything."
Even her GE2025 candidacy fails to be a high point by her standards, she added.
"I do feel that stepping up here might not be my highlight, but I'm hoping that it will cause a chain effect where people look and see that the opposition is doing something. We're, you know, making waves.