GE2015: PAP wins Jalan Besar GRC with 67.7% of votes

(SINGAPORE) The People's Action Party (PAP) defeated the Workers' Party (WP) in the resurrected four-member Jalan Besar GRC.

Led by Minister for Communications and Information, Yaacob Ibrahim, the PAP team clinched 67.73 per cent of the vote against a relatively low-key WP quartet.

Like Dr Yaacob, who entered politics in 1997, the other members of the PAP team are also seasoned election contestants - Senior Minister of State Heng Chee How (since 2001); medical doctor Lily Neo (since 1997) and mayor Denise Phua (since 2006).

Two members of the WP team contested the 2011 general election : polytechnic lecturer L Somasundaram and social worker Frieda Chan. Businessman Adrian Sim Tian Hock and Redzwan Hafidz, an engineer, make up the rest of the team.

Previously a single seat ward, Jalan Besar became a GRC in 1988, and had been keenly contested by opposition parties at virtually every election. The GRC was, however, dissolved in 2011, making way for a new five-member Moulmein-Kallang GRC. The 2011 election saw a keen battle between PAP and WP in the GRC, with PAP polling 58.55 per cent of the vote.

Moulmein-Kallang has now disappeared off the electoral map, and Jalan Besar GRC revived, reabsorbing wards such as Whampoa. With just over 102,500 voters, Jalan Besar is the third smallest GRC.

Read more about GE2015 here.