Latest news with #HarpreetSinghNehal
AsiaOne
13-05-2025
- Politics
- AsiaOne
'You're not getting rid of me that easily': WP's Harpreet Singh says Punggol team will continue groundwork, Singapore News
The Workers' Party (WP) Punggol team will continue their groundwork and outreach initiatives, Harpreet Singh Nehal said in a Facebook post on Friday (May 9). The 59-year-old senior counsel also responded to a comment that said he probably has one general election left in him due to his age. "I'm sorry, but you don't know me, bro," Singh said, adding that he is in good health. "Let's just say — you're not getting rid of me that easily." In the recent election, Singh contested Punggol GRC with WP teammates Alia Mattar, Jackson Au and Alexis Dang, earning 44.83 per cent of total votes. They lost to the People's Action Party (PAP) team consisting Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong, Senior Minister of State for Health and Digital Development and Information Janil Puthucheary, Minister of State for Home Affairs and Social and Family Development Sun Xueling as well as Yeo Wan Ling, who garnered 55.17 per cent of votes. Singh said in his Facebook post that the response in Punggol and throughout Singapore has been "overwhelming", with his team being told to "come back" and "continue the fight". He pledged to continue walking the ground in Punggol during the weeks and months ahead. Meaningful change takes years of commitment, presence, and continuity, Singh said, adding that is "the WP way". "We ran this race to serve our country. And that calling doesn't end with the election. We do not just turn up every five years." The WP team in Punggol is just getting started, he added. In an earlier Facebook post on May 4, Singh said the results in Punggol show that "something is shifting". "We may not have crossed the finish line this time, but that's no reason to give up hope. Because when enough of us believe in change, and act on it — change comes." [[nid:717690]]
Independent Singapore
12-05-2025
- Politics
- Independent Singapore
Harpreet Singh: WP team in Punggol is just getting started
SINGAPORE: Harpreet Singh Nehal, who had been part of the Workers' Party slate in the May 3 polls, said in a recent social media post that the Workers' Party (WP) team at Punggol 'is just getting started'. The team, comprising Senior Counsel Mr Singh, legal counsel Siti Mattar, business development professional Alexis Dang, and communications practitioner Jackson Au, won 44.83% of the vote. This was a very respectable showing for an all-newbie slate that was up against a team from the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) headed by Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) Gan Kim Yong and that also included the very popular Minister of State for Home Affairs and Social and Family Development, Sun Xueling. Mr Singh jokingly addressed those who may have thought the WP team would only be seen in the lead-up to the next election. 'SORRY—YOU WON'T SEE US IN FIVE YEARS,' he wrote, 'You'll see us much earlier than that!' The Senior Counsel added, 'The Workers' Party team in Punggol is just getting started. We may not have won the seat this time, but your response—in Punggol and throughout Singapore—has been overwhelming.' He also promised that the team would continue with groundwork and outreach initiatives 'because meaningful change takes more than just nine days of campaigning—it takes years of commitment, presence, and continuity' and appealed to like-minded people to join in. Towards the end of his post, Mr Singh addressed a commentator who had pointed out that at 59, he may only be able to contest one more time. 'Well, well, well… I'm sorry, but you don't know me, bro. 'I'm in good health, good shape, and (touch wood) I plan to be here for a long, long time! 'Let's just say — you're not getting rid of me that easily.' His post has since received many likes, comments, and shares, with many Facebook users expressing their support and encouragement. Even former Nominated Member of Parliament Calvin Cheng, known for his pro-government views, commented on his post, writing, 'I do wish you a healthy, long life and many more elections to come! Hope to meet you one day.' 'You got me with your first line Mr Harpreet Singh Nehal. I am so glad and heartened to know that your solid solid team will continue to work hard and win Punggol over. I knew that you will never give up!' another netizen wrote. A commenter urged him to consider a lesson from history. 'Looking at the past, the Workers' Party took at least 2 GEs to win Aljunied, Hougang, etc. Well, we were THAT close to win Tampines GRC, Jalan Kayu SMC &…. Punggol GRC.. Don't despair, I'm sure you guys will be there & ready to dominate by GE2030! Go Hammers!!' /TISG Read also: 'We won something deeper': Harpreet Singh's post leaves people hopeful that he'll stay in politics
Independent Singapore
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Independent Singapore
GE2025: Most promising newcomers
SINGAPORE: With a few days left before Singaporeans troop to the polls on Saturday (May 3), The Independent Singapore would like to put forward the candidates who, we feel, are the most promising newbies for GE2025. In what some have deemed the most exciting elections in Singapore's history, here are five candidates who, for us, have stood out among the pack. Harpreet Singh Nehal Whether you call him 'Happy' or 'Harpoon,' no one can deny that The Workers' Party's 'biggest catch' of this election year, Harpreet Singh Nehal, 59, certainly has impressive credentials: Harvard Law School graduate, Senior Counsel of the Supreme Court, and more. A video clip from 1996 of a 30-year-old Mr Singh raising questions to then-Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew regarding property prices and 'the Singapore dream' is still shared today. 'Some of the questions like housing don't look out of place despite being asked in 1996,' wrote a Reddit user recently. How big a threat is Mr Singh to the powers that be? Perhaps the size of a Deputy Prime Minister, it would seem. Alexis Dang Some Singaporeans may vote with their heads, others with their hearts, but some may be voting with their eyes? This might explain the sudden jump in popularity of WP candidate Alexis Dang, 39, who, like Mr Singh, is part of the party's Punggol team. However, the supporters of Ms Dang are saying that she's the total package of brains and beauty. A number of commenters have noted how fluent she is in Mandarin and have said they're eager to see her debating in the language in Parliament. 'Alexis fever' reached a new high this weekend. On Sunday night (Apr 27), a clip of people queuing to take a photo with Ms Dang was shared online. Singaporeans queue to take photo with Alexis Dang byu/moonlighthorfun insingapore Ariffin Sha Wake Up, Singapore founder Ariffin Sha, 27, is part of the Singapore Democratic Party's slate at Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC. Compared to other candidates, Mr Sha, who is a law graduate, may seem young, but in actuality, he's been part of the national political discourse since he was 16, as CNA pointed out. While he hopes for the best outcome for his team, he knows the fight will be a tough one. Nevertheless, he said at the PSP rally on April 24, 'If you remember just one line… let it be this: smaller margins of victory lead to better policies and welfare for the people.' Lawrence Pek PSP candidate Lawrence Pek for Chua Chu Kang GRC is a former secretary-general of the Singapore Manufacturing Federation (SMF). Earlier this month, together with former WP MP Leon Perera, Mr Pek published a well-received article in the sociopolitical magazine Jom, making the case for a universal minimum wage to be implemented in Singapore . As head of the SMF from 2020 to 2023, Mr Pek championed the interests of Singaporean manufacturers in discussions with government agencies and foreign embassies 'I hope that with my diverse multinational experience in the business world, I can play a part in making Singapore better at balancing the needs and interests of workers and businesses,' he says. Bernadette Giam Thirty-eight-year-old Bernadette Giam is the director of Creative Eateries, a local food and beverage SME. She is a People's Action Party candidate at Sengkang GRC, having taken over as Sengkang East branch chairperson earlier this year. A community volunteer for over a decade, her focus has been on uplifting women, youth, and seniors. Prime Minister Lawrence Wong has said that Ms Giam will be a strong advocate for working parents and young people in Sengkang, and Home and Law Affairs Minister K Shanmugam was impressed with Ms Giam's speech in Tamil on Nomination Day. Choo Pei Ling Last, but by no means least, is Choo Pei Ling, who is part of the PAP slate at Chua Chu Kang GRC. Dr Choo is both a neuroscientist and physiotherapist, as well as an Assistant Professor at the Singapore Institute of Technology, where she carries out research on optimising life after a stroke as part of transforming community health, among other topics. She has been active in the community for over two decades and has helped with Meet the People sessions for a number of years. /TISG Read also: Rotten Tomatoes: Here are the cringiest GE2025 candidates so far
CNA
24-04-2025
- Politics
- CNA
GE2025: Hundreds of fake Facebook accounts, bots spreading anti-PAP and anti-WP sentiments; MDDI urges public to be discerning
Singapore The bots being tracked by CNA have been posting misinformation, half-truths and highly one-sided opinions without substantiation that are intended to rile up genuine users on Facebook. SINGAPORE: Anonymous Facebook profiles with inauthentic or falsified origins, also known as bots, have been active online during the 2025 General Elections and have targeted both the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) and the Workers' Party (WP), checks by CNA have found. To this end, the Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI) said on Tuesday (Apr 22) that it is looking into these accounts. 'The government is looking into these online accounts, which have been set up recently, and appear to target different political parties,' said MDDI. 'We will continue to monitor the online space for foreign interference and will act on content that is in breach of our laws. We urge the public to be discerning consumers of information.' Over the past week, CNA detected a flood of negative comments made by unverifiable Facebook accounts aimed at certain personalities in the WP as well as the PAP. On April 20, PAP's blog, Petir, posted two articles rebutting claims by WP prospective candidate Harpreet Singh Nehal related to the issue of a minority race prime minister. This was followed by news coverage from various online news outlets, including Mediacorp's 8world as well as Mothership. Their articles were shared on Facebook posts that allowed users to add their comments. Mr Singh also made a Facebook post on his rebuttal to Petir. A total of 409 instances of suspicious posts and comments were detected on April 20, originating from 149 unique profiles. The posts were levied both at Mr Singh as well as at the PAP, including comments that state oft-repeated anti-WP or anti-PAP phrases found on online forums and social media. They appear to be aimed at an English-speaking audience and carry a similar tone – either strongly partisan statements, repeated slogans or provocative insults. Several also include misinformation or half-truths, including some that cast aspersions on Mr Singh's credentials as a lawyer. Most include highly inflammatory opinions that lacked substantiation. Example of an inauthentic account which commented on a news article about WP candidate Harpreet Singh. Nearly three-quarters of these posts were made on April 20 itself, with a large bulk of the posts made after Petir first published its articles at 1pm on April 20. This was odd as Petir's article concerned an interview that Mr Singh gave to podcast Yah Lah But that was published on April 10, but CNA did not detect significant bot activity at the time. Upon closer inspection, 90 out of the 149 unique Facebook accounts are flagged as 'fake'. The remaining 59 were inspected manually for any cues of authenticity, and all were found to be bots. While it is still possible that a human may create these accounts and posts individually, or create spam of a partisan nature, spamming is not a typical behaviour for genuine users in a news comment section. Example of an inauthentic account that has been posting partisan content on Facebook. For example, in one post by Mothership on Apr 20 on Petir's articles, there were a total of 151 comments from 56 authors. This indicates that bots posted multiple comments on a single post – one bot account seen by CNA made 16 comments in about 90 minutes. The burst of comments by a handful of accounts is also a sign of coordinated 'bot swarming' activity. In Mothership's Facebook post for example, around 80 per cent of the 151 comments were posted around two hours after it was first published. At one point, multiple bot accounts were detected commenting simultaneously in the first minute that the post went live. FURTHER ANALYSIS OF BOT CAMPAIGNS Thereafter, CNA looked at other GE-related news events that also saw a hive of activity emanate from some of these bot accounts. The user comments section of 10 Facebook posts by three news organisations, CNA, Mothership, the Straits Times, were analysed over several days. The posts links to various articles about the retirements of four PAP politicians, Mr Louis Ng, Dr Ng Eng Hen, Dr Maliki Osman, and Mr Teo Chee Hean. Out of a total of 3,428 comments, about 47 per cent – or 1,608 posts – were flagged as originating from suspicious or fake accounts. Upon further inspection, a total of 581 unique fake accounts were found to be responsible for a majority of these inauthentic posts. Most of these accounts posted only one comment in a single thread, creating the appearance of broad, organic participation. These bots mainly posted either anti-PAP or anti-WP messages in the comments section. For example, in one CNA post about Mr Ng stepping down from Nee Soon Group Representation Constituency, one user named 'Dunkie Rookie' was able to attract substantially high engagement from other users. An example of a bot account on Facebook that has been creating partisan content. In another example in the same post, two users 'Wefo Ong' and 'Jon Cena' drove critical messages about the PAP through the use of mocking language. The posts also received high engagement. One of the bots being tracked by CNA that has been creating partisan content on Facebook. The content in these examples are not novel. However, the accounts that posted them are inauthentic. CNA also found 44 bots that were active in both the posts of four retiring PAP politicians as well as the earlier posts on WP's Mr Harpreet Singh. Two of these bot accounts that had changed their Facebook profile name in the process. An account appearing as 'Jamal Bashir' in the earlier posts on Mr Singh later altered its name to 'Vince Varun' when commenting on the PAP retirements. Another account 'Teck Beng Tan' was shortened to 'Tan TB'. These attempts show an effort to avoid detection by other genuine Facebook users, but CNA was able to track these inauthentic accounts despite their evasion techniques. Apart from bot activities linked to Facebook posts, CNA also discovered several accounts on TikTok that produce anti-establishment content, including some that produce content targeting Law and Home Minister K Shanmugam. These accounts typically employ short-form videos showing image macros with AI-generated voice overs that repeat highly partisan remarks in a bite-sized format designed to be shared. It is not known what the origin of these accounts are, or whether the owner of these accounts are located in Singapore. TELLTALE SIGNS OF INAUTHENTICITY AND BOT BEHAVIOUR Some telltale signs of inauthentic accounts are: They were recently created, have few connections, and their posts mainly comprise a single type of content, such as those that attack a political party and its candidates. They also lack any original posts, such as photos of someone's day, that indicate the account is a real person. Bots, on the other hand, are multiple fake accounts managed by individuals, which also suggest a more coordinated attempt to spread a certain messaging on the platform. They are also known to make repeated comments or replies, similar to techniques used by spammers. Sometimes, multiple fake accounts end up posting similar comments, albeit with slight variations to avoid detection. Both types of behaviour run afoul of Facebook's community standards. CNA has sought comment from Meta, which owns Facebook. GE2025 Facebook MDDI bots fake news
