1956-1965: Pre-independence and beginnings , the first
Chief Minister of Singapore and founder of the Workers' Party In 1956, Singapore's first
Chief Minister,
David Saul Marshall, resigned his leadership post for
Labour Front (the largest party in the assembly at the time) following the failure of the
Merdeka Talks that had sought self-governance for Singapore. Marshall remained as the party's
backbencher in the
Legislative Assembly until his resignation in 1957. On 3 November that year, Marshall went on to found the Workers' Party. Following the adoption of the Rendel and McNeice Commission recommendations, the six wards in the city area consisting of 18 elected seats was carved into 32. In 1957, the pro-communists backed two new entrants, the Workers' Party and the
People's Action Party, which later went on to become the long-running governing party in Singapore. Their electoral debut was mostly a success as the party elected four members (out of the five contested) to the City Council; however, in 1958, Kallang ward incumbent Chang Yuen Tong resigned, and subsequently lost their seat to PAP as a result of their by-election defeat. The party's first Legislative election in
1959 did not see success unlike the 1957 City Election, as Marshall failed to retake his seat from 1955 to 1957,
Cairnhill constituency; it was won by former Chief Minister and
Singapore People's Alliance leader
Lim Yew Hock, and the WP did not win any of the three contested seats. That same election also saw PAP became the majority party for the very first time. In May 1961, a
by-election was precipitated due to the passing of
Anson constituency's incumbent MP Baharuddin Mohammed Ariff. Marshall then went to declare his candidacy with the statement: "... effective, vigorous and constructive opposition and to protect them against the arrogant dictatorship of unchallenged power. Marshall was also eager to assist the workers to prevent the political enslavement of trade unions and to revive the struggle against colonialism in seeking complete independence preferably within and, if necessary, without the Federation." On 15 July, Marshall won the by-election and subsequently returned to the
Legislative Assembly. David Marshall, as Chairman of the party, made his views known on merger at public rallies and radio talks. Marshall's stand on merger was that: "... Singapore should seek equal privileges and rights for its citizens in the new federation but surrender autonomy in education and labour, since different policies in these crucial areas would undermine the stability of Malaysia in the long run. He further maintained that if Singapore could not negotiate for a complete merger, she should seek independence on her own, a proposition which drew gales of laughter from the Legislative Chamber at that time. Marshall's strongest objection to the White Paper merger terms was on the point of citizenship and the implications of citizenship in the new federation. He saw the provisions as denying the Singapore citizen who was a federal national, the right of political participation in terms of being allowed to organise or contest in an election in the other states of the Federation. Singaporeans would in his view, be no more than favoured foreigners in the Federation, permitted to live and work there without visas, but also without the important constitutional guarantees that immigration barriers would not be raised against them." The party concerned Marshall's issue of common citizenship and the rights of Singapore citizens when they joined the Federation. Marshall later stated on 20 August 1962: "... issued a statement to advise his Executive Council and party members to accept the White Paper proposals for merger, but continued to oppose the Government on the referendum urging the people to cast blank votes on the grounds that it was undemocratically conducted."
1965–1986: Post-independence, debut of J.B. Jeyaretnam On 9 August 1965, Singapore was declared as an independent sovereign state, and the Legislative was reformed as
Parliament of Singapore. 1968 was the first post-independence election, which saw PAP winning every one of 58 contested seats (51 by a walkover, and the other seven on polling day), due to the election boycotting of the main opposition party at the time, the
Barisan Sosialis, leading to the mass arrests of most of its leadership since 1963. Having become a small and fairly insignificant party by the late-1960s, the party saw a rejuvenation upon the recruitment of a group of lawyers, including
J.B. Jeyaretnam, who became the party's
Secretary-General. Despite fielding a large slate of candidates in succeeding elections, the ruling PAP still managed to retain its monopoly by winning every contested seat for the next three general elections (including by-elections) until 1981. On 13 October 1981,
Devan Nair vacated his Anson seat to assume his role as the nation's third
President, precipitating the
by-election; on 31 October, the party's candidate Jeyaretnam secured a historic victory as he became the first opposition MP-elect to be elected in Parliament with 51.9% (7,012) of the valid votes cast, beating PAP's
Pang Kim Hin's 47.1% (6,359) and UPF's Harbans Singh's 1.0% (131). This also marked the first time since 1961 that the Anson electorate voted the WP into the assembly. Jeyaretnam then went on to hold the constituency in the
1984 elections with an increased margin of 56.8%. However, two months later, Jeyaretnam was charged with falsely accounting the party's funds. In 1986, Senior District Judge Michael Khoo found Jeyaretnam innocent of all charges but one. The prosecution later appealed for a retrial to be held in a different district court, which saw Jeyaretnam found guilty on all charges resulting in his disqualification. Though he subsequently remained as the party's Secretary-General, he was also barred from standing in elections until 1991.
1987–1997: Barisan Sosialis merger, debut of Low Thia Khiang , a
safe seat for the WP. The party, fielding
Low Thia Khiang, first won the constituency in
1991. In 1987, some Workers' Party members were among a group of 22 people arrested by Singapore's
Internal Security Department as part of
Operation Spectrum, accused of being
Marxists. They were released on condition that they kept out of politics. Prior to the
1988 general elections,
Barisan Sosialis and the Singapore United Front merged with the party to gather the opposition parties together to challenge the PAP and also the need to form teams of candidates to contest in the new
Group Representation Constituency (GRC) system for the upcoming election. WP did not win any constituency but came very close to winning the
Eunos GRC, in which the party's team, consisting of
Francis Seow (a former head of the Bar Society who had briefly been detained under the
Internal Security Act prior to the general election),
Lee Siew Choh (a former chairman of the
Barisan Sosialis and former PAP Assemblyman from 1959 to 1961) and Mohd Khalit bin Mohd Baboo, scored 49.1%; only one opposition MP was returned to Parliament (
Chiam See Tong of the
Singapore Democratic Party). However, since the team garnered the highest percentage of the vote secured by losing opposition candidates during the election, the party was eligible to nominate two members of its team to become
Non-constituency MPs (NCMPs). The party had refused to nominate NCMPs in the past, but this time they nominated Lee and Seow to do so. While Lee accepted the offer, Seow however declined to do so and instead fled the United States following accusations of espionage. The election also marked the political debut of then-organising secretary
Low Thia Khiang, who contested the three-seat
Tiong Bahru GRC, and would capture its eventual safe seat of
Hougang SMC in the
1991 general election.
Jeyaretnam was sued for
slander by then Prime Minister
Lee Kuan Yew for comments he made at an election rally in 1988; Jeyaretnam was ordered to pay Lee damages of
S$260,000 including costs following an unsuccessful lawsuit. Jeyaretnam was again sued and paid damages of S$465,000 and S$250,000 in court costs for an article he wrote in an issue of the party's newspaper,
The Hammer, where he called
Indian PAP leaders stooges. During the 1991 election campaign, one of the WP's candidates in Eunos GRC,
Jufrie Mahmood, came under fire from the PAP and Prime Minister
Goh Chok Tong as they accused him of being a
Malay chauvinist, a claim which Jufrie strongly denied. As with the 1988 election, the WP lost to the PAP team while polling strongly in the GRC (47.6% to 52.4%). No NCMPs were offered as the opposition (including Low) elected now occupied a combined four seats in parliament. Following the election, Low became the Assistant Secretary-General. A by-election in
Marine Parade GRC in 1992 was expected to mark the return of Jeyaretnam to electoral politics after his Parliamentary ban had expired; however, the team ultimately did not participate due to one of its candidates turning up late on the nomination day. In 1993, Jeyaretnam and another candidate, Tan Soo Phuan (now a member of
Democratic Progressive Party), attempted to seek candidacy in the first-ever
presidential election; however, both candidates were not granted the Certificate of Eligibility, an item presidential candidates required to complete their nominations. In 1996, Lee Siew Choh resigned from the party, citing differences with Jeyaretnam.
1997–2006: Renewal in the new millennium In the
1997 elections, Low was re-elected as Hougang MP in the 1997 general election. Besides Low, only one other opposition MP was elected (Chiam See Tong, who left SDP to join the
Singapore People's Party); one NCMP was to be nominated from the WP team for
Cheng San GRC, as they had polled better than any other losing opposition candidates with 45.2% of the vote share; the party selected secretary-general (and candidate) Jeyaretnam as the NCMP, marking his return to Parliament after 11 years. During the election campaign, another candidate who was part of the WP's team in Cheng San, lawyer
Tang Liang Hong, drew particular attention from the PAP as they accused him of being an anti-Christian and anti-
Muslim Chinese chauvinist. Tang, who insisted all he was trying to do was to "better represent the Chinese community and ask questions on their behalf", vigorously denied this charge and accused the PAP of trying to win votes by damaging his reputation and preventing people from voting him. Tang also attacked the PAP with regards to the Hotel Properties Ltd case (which started when the
Stock Exchange of Singapore criticised Hotel Properties Ltd for its "tardiness" in disclosing details of sales of its condominium units to directors and their family members). Lee, who had purchased one of the units, claimed that Tang was trying to milk this issue for political capital; the PAP sued Tang for defamation and branding the PAP leadership as liars, for a total of S$13.6 million of damages. Tang fled to Australia shortly after the election, and never returned back until his death in 2025. Prior to the
2001 election, Jeyaretnam was discharged from his NCMP seat due to an undischarged bankruptcy (having failed to keep up with payments of S$120,000 worth of damages owed from a libel suit brought by
Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and other PAP leaders following comments he had made at an election rally in 1997, but since fulfilled and discharged from bankruptcy in May 2007); Jeyaretnam then relinquished his Secretary-General post to Low. The party became acrimonious as Jeyaretnam later accused Low of not doing enough to help him pay the damages from the libel suit. In response, Low claimed that he had always looked upon Jeyaretnam as an elder and had done everything possible to help him. Following the renewal, a few members (including Jeyaretnam) left the party, forming the
Reform Party in June 2008; Jeyaretnam later died of
heart failure three months after the party's founding. Many observers speculated that with Low at the helm, WP would campaign in a more
centrist manner for the 2001 election. After assuming leadership, Low recruited a series of young members to the party, including
James Gomez,
Yaw Shin Leong and
Sylvia Lim (who would become the chairperson of the party). During the
2001 general election, WP only contested Hougang and Nee Soon East SMCs while plans to contest the GRCs of
Ang Mo Kio,
East Coast and
Pasir Ris–Punggol were abandoned. WP also attempted their bid to contest
Aljunied GRC, but were later disqualified. Low called the disqualification in Aljunied GRC an "oversight" and a belated
April Fools' joke, saying that he took full responsibility for it. Low was re-elected as the MP of Hougang SMC albeit a drop of his vote share, winning the only seat for WP in the election.
2006–2011: Major electoral breakthroughs, debut of Pritam Singh Stadium. WP launched an updated
manifesto in January 2006 entitled "You Have a Choice". The 52-page booklet outlined the party's stand on issues and policies, covering areas from economic and judicial policies to media and sports and recreation. The manifesto, which had last been updated in 1994, took one year to work on according to Low. PAP then panned the party's manifesto citing "time-bombs", quipping that it contained only threats to the PAP's power. At the
2006 general election, Low was elected as Hougang MP for the fourth time by an increased margin of 62.7%. The party also polled strongly in Aljunied GRC, losing to the PAP's team with 43.91% of the vote to 56.09% and allowing the party to elect an NCMP seat by virtue of being the best-performing opposition losers. The party's chairperson Sylvia Lim was selected, becoming its first female NCMP. Another team of young first-time candidates, led by
Yaw Shin Leong in
Ang Mo Kio GRC which was helmed by then Prime Minister
Lee Hsien Loong, garnered 33.86%, around one-third, of the vote, about 0.46% higher than the opposition's national average. Combining all the votes received from the seven constituencies contested by 20 candidates, the Workers' Party's popular vote was 38.43%; the party then became the largest opposition to emerge from the election, in front of the second strongest-performing opposition party, the
Singapore Democratic Alliance (the party also fielded the same number of candidates contesting the same number of constituencies) which had gotten 32.52%. This meant that Low would succeed
Chiam See Tong as the new
leader of the opposition. The manifesto for the
2011 general election was titled "Towards a First World Parliament", which also became their campaign slogan. One key proposal was for more affordable public housing such that
Housing Development Board (HDB) lessees should be able to pay off their mortgage loans within 20 years rather than 30. Prior to nomination day (27 April 2011), Low announced that he would vacate his Hougang seat to former Ang Mo Kio GRC candidate Yaw Shin Leong, instead contesting in Aljunied GRC for the forthcoming election along with Lim and three of his "A-List" candidates (Taiwanese-born corporate lawyer
Chen Show Mao, law postgraduate and former
SAF major Pritam Singh, and freelance counsellor
Faisal Manap). The party fielded a total of 23 candidates contesting in eight constituencies, their largest slate since 1988; it was second only to the
National Solidarity Party's (NSP) slate, which had 24 candidates in eight constituencies. On 7 May, the WP team in Aljunied GRC achieved the first-ever GRC victory for any opposition party in history; their score of 54.71% unseated the PAP team, led by
Foreign Minister George Yeo and
Minister of the Prime Minister's Office Lim Hwee Hua. The Hougang ward was also retained by Yaw with its best performance for the party at 64.80% of the votes (second only to Chiam's 1991 score of 69.6%), resulting in six WP members being elected into Parliament. Their party's overall vote was its best performance in history, with 46.60% of the votes combined from the eight constituencies contested (second only to SDP's popular vote of 48.56% in 1991). Additionally, Lim and Manap became the first female former NCMP and Malay opposition MP respectively to be elected into Parliament. Due to an increase of minimum opposition seats from three to nine, the party was also offered two of the three NCMP seats. After selecting
Gerald Giam and
Yee Jenn Jong (who contested
East Coast GRC and
Joo Chiat SMC respectively), the party brought its total representation to eight seats, the most for any opposition party in Singapore since independence. East Coast GRC candidate Eric Tan later resigned from WP, citing his disagreement with the NCMP appointment. A month later on 12 June, the party launched its grassroots arm for Aljunied GRC, called the Aljunied Constituency Committee. It also combined the Hougang and Aljunied town councils to form the Aljunied–Hougang Town Council (AHTC).
2012–2013: Success in by-elections and start of AHTC lawsuit , one of the counting centres for the
Punggol East SMC (later as
Sengkang GRC since 2020). On 15 February 2012, the party expelled Hougang SMC MP
Yaw Shin Leong, for failing to account for allegations made against him. Prior to his expulsion, Yaw was accused of having an extramarital affair, as well as party misconduct that had surfaced earlier that year; Yaw had up to 24 February to appeal against his expulsion, but declined, precipitating the
by-election which was held on 26 May. The seat was retained by 2011 East Coast GRC candidate
Png Eng Huat with a majority of 62.08%. Shortly after the elections, Poh Lee Guan was also expelled from the party after attempting to contest the by-election as a "backup candidate" without consulting the party's CEC, with the CEC condemning Poh's reason as unacceptable. On 12 December, a
by-election to be held the following year was called after PAP MP for
Punggol East SMC and speaker
Michael Palmer resigned for having an affair with a
People's Association (PA) staff; the party announced their candidacy shortly after the announcement. Prior to nomination day, the party announced plans to purchase its own premises as its current rented premises at Syed Alwi Road was too small for its operations. Sufficient funds were eventually raised and the new HQ was opened in 2017, coinciding with the party's 60th anniversary. On 16 January 2013, the party fielded
Lee Li Lian, a candidate who had previously contested the same ward in the 2011 election. On 26 January, Lee was elected with 54.52% of the votes (
Koh Poh Koon from the PAP received 43.71%, and the remaining 1.77% went to two minor parties), marking the second
by-election since 1981 in which the party had gained any parliamentary seats from the PAP. Ahead of the two by-elections, WP called for a tender for managing agent services for their town council, with only FMSS submitting a bid. After the Punggol East by-election, Punggol East SMC was absorbed into AHTC, renaming the Town Council to Aljunied–Hougang–Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC) until the
2015 election, when Lee was defeated for reelection (see below). In February 2015, the
Auditor-General's Office (AGO) carried out an audit on AHPETC and found several lapses in governance and compliance, which became the subject of parliamentary debate.
2015–2016: Leadership renewal Ahead of the 2015 elections, coinciding with the nation's golden jubilee, the party announced that it would contest 28 seats (in ten constituencies), slightly under a third of the 89 parliamentary seats. They revealed their slogan for the election, "Empower Your Future". In August 2015, chairwoman Lim confirmed the first batch of candidates, with all seven elected MPs defending their respective constituencies. By the end of the month, the party's line-up was unveiled and finalised. On 11 September, the team for
Aljunied GRC and Hougang SMC were re-elected for another term in Parliament, but by a reduced winning margin of 50.96% and 57.69% respectively, while in Punggol East SMC, incumbent Lee lost reelection to Deputy Speaker and PAP candidate
Charles Chong with 48.24% of the vote. The party's overall popular vote in the constituencies it contested fell from 46.60% to 39.75%. Consequently, the party became the only opposition party to be represented in Parliament for the first time since 1981–84, having received all three
NCMP seats, totalling the minimum nine opposition members when added to the six seats of their two retained constituencies. Lee was the first of the three NCMPs;
Dennis Tan, who had contested
Fengshan SMC, was next in line, while the party's East Coast GRC team nominated
Leon Perera for the third seat. Following Lee's decline of the offer, the party announced that they would nominate
Daniel Goh from East Coast GRC as the third NCMP should Parliament allow another appointment. The PAP-controlled Parliament approved Goh's appointment on 29 January 2016, allowing him to be elected as an NCMP via an announcement from the Election Department on 4 February. On 29 May 2016, leader Low successfully fended off an unprecedented challenge for his
Secretary-General post by Chen for the first time in the party's history. Chen was re-appointed by Low to his previous position as Treasurer for another three months from 7 June 2016 until 9 September 2016, as he had already served two terms in the post. On 7 June, the party appointed
Pritam Singh as Assistant Secretary-General.
2016–2019: Continued AHTC lawsuits and handover to Pritam Singh On 26 July 2017, AHTC, which had appointed an independent panel of three lawyers at the behest of MND and
HDB, sued town council chairperson Singh, vice-chairperson Lim, party leader Low, and three others, including the town council's former managing agent, for improper payments made to the MA. On 29 September, the party's headquarters were relocated from Syed Alwi Road to the Teambuild Centre, along Geylang Road. On 3 November, an anniversary dinner was held on
Harbourfront Centre, marking a milestone of 60 years since the founding of the party on 3 November 1957. On the same night, Low announced during his speech that he would step down from his role of Secretary-General and would not seek candidacy for the next CEC's election the following year. A commemorative biographical book for the party,
Walking With Singapore, was launched at bookstores the following day. Singh was elected to the post of Secretary-General unopposed on 8 April 2018 after Low decided to step down for leadership renewal. On 26 July, the WP was among the nine opposition parties invited for a gathering led by former PAP member and presidential candidate
Tan Cheng Bock, but did not attend. The party later announced that it was "going through a leadership transition" and "is focused on organisation building to better serve Singaporeans". On 3 October, a $33.7 million trial was initiated between AHTC and the defendants of Low, Lim, Singh, and two other town councillors. The trial went on until 25 October, where the three politicians launched an appeal to fund their legal fees, having depleted their personal resources after paying their lawyers close to S$600,000 for work done before the trial. Three days later, they closed their fundraising appeal after raising more than S$1 million for legal fees, while thanking the public for their support.
2020–2025: Further gains, Raeesah Khan's controversy and end of AHTC lawsuits Ahead of the elections on 10 July 2020, the party introduced their slogan, "Make Your Vote Count" along with 12 new party members, which included ex-
NSP candidate
Nicole Seah. On Nomination Day, they fielded a total of 21 candidates to contest in six constituencies:
Hougang SMC and the existing GRCs of
Aljunied,
East Coast, and
Marine Parade, as well as the newly formed
Punggol West SMC and
Sengkang GRC.
Low Thia Khiang, along with fellow incumbents Chen Show Mao and Png Eng Huat, did not contest the election, marking Low's retirement after a 32-year career. Low had earlier been hospitalised on 30 April due to a head injury he sustained and was on rehabilitation. They were replaced respectively by NCMPs
Gerald Giam,
Leon Perera and
Dennis Tan to complete the team line-up. Former NCMP
Daniel Goh and former Punggol East MP
Lee Li Lian also did not stand for the election. During campaigning, Sengkang GRC candidate
Jamus Lim received critical acclaim during a live debate on 1 July for his debating skills and charisma. On 5 July, two separate police reports were lodged against
Raeesah Khan, another Sengkang GRC candidate, both for alleged discriminatory comments regarding race and religion. She later told the media that she had intended to promote awareness about minority concerns, while also expressing remorse for having made said insensitive comments. The
Singapore Police Force warned her on 17 September of the same year. On 10 July, the WP became the best performing opposition party to date, with 10 elected seats and 50.49% of contested votes, surpassing the previous record of 48.46% held by SDP in 1991 and becoming the first opposition party to win the combined popular vote in contested seats. The party increased their margins in
Aljunied GRC and
Hougang SMC with 59.95% and 61.21% respectively, while also capturing the new
Sengkang GRC with 52.12% of the vote, making it the second GRC to be captured by any opposition party. Unlike in the past three elections, the party was not offered NCMP seats as their best losing performance in East Coast GRC (46.61%) was behind that of the
Progress Singapore Party (PSP) in
West Coast GRC (48.32%). Following the election,
Hougang SMC became the first constituency to have elected the opposition for seven consecutive terms. Singh was also appointed as the first official
Leader of the Opposition by Prime Minister
Lee Hsien Loong, the role having been unofficial in the past. On 27 December, five months after the elections, another CEC election was held at
Clarke Quay, with Lim and Singh re-elected as Chair and Secretary-General respectively. All four Sengkang GRC members, as well as Nicole Seah and Kenneth Foo were elected into the CEC, while former MPs Chen, Goh and Lee, as well as Firuz Khan, John Yam and Terence Tan, stepped down. On 30 November 2021, Sengkang MP
Raeesah Khan resigned from the WP and Parliament after being investigated for lying during parliamentary speeches on women's empowerment, which happened three months earlier. Two days later, the Central Executive Committee (CEC) claimed to have known about the lies the week after her speech, but allowed her to clarify herself after knowing her circumstances. Furthermore, it was claimed that the party leaders voted overwhelmingly to ask Khan to resign even before she did so, threatening to expel her otherwise. Instead, Khan informed Singh that she would resign, before the CEC met on the matter. The other three MPs for Sengkang GRC did not step down for a by-election, as the GRC was not empty; the responsibilities for Compassvale were instead divided among them. Then-party vice-chair and
Aljunied GRC MP
Faisal Manap also became an advisor for Compassvale until the
2025 general election. Former NCMP
Daniel Goh publicly questioned Khan's resignation on Facebook in several posts and also asked the party leadership to take responsibility for "allowing the transgression to persist". He was subsequently expelled from the WP in 2023. On 7 July 2023, the
Supreme Court of Singapore found both Lim and Low, but not Singh, liable for control failures in regards to payment processes in both Aljunied-Hougang and Sengkang Town Councils, leading to a risk of overpayment. The court found them to have breached their fiduciary duties in 2019, but a subsequent appeal in 2022 revealed that its party councillors and the town employees did not owe fiduciary duties. On 22 August, the
Ministry of National Development brought considerations for regulatory action pending clarification from AHTC, under witness of its three party leaders, as well as town councillors Chua Zhi Hon, Kenneth Foo, How Weng Fan and Danny Loh, to ensure the safekeeping of the money totaling S$33.7 million in improper payments. In a statement from the Court of Appeal on 29 November, both town councils were ordered to pay a combined total of about S$388,800 (S$176,241.11 and S$212,543.52 for AHTC and SKTC, respectively) to the town councillors as a result of the appeals, where the court determined that most issues in their appeals were not found from AHTC, and that liabilities of certain duties had since persisted. The three aforementioned MPs, however, had also been liable for negligence to SKTC for permitting control failures as well. On 17 July 2023, a video of Aljunied MP
Leon Perera and the party's youth wing president
Nicole Seah behaving intimately in a restaurant surfaced online. Perera's former personal driver had also been involved in the alleged relationship according to a press interview. While he had approached the party leaders about this between 2020 and 2021, they deferred to the pair's denials. Seah and Perera resigned on 18 and 19 July respectively, acknowledging that the extramarital affair had happened but claiming that it "stopped sometime ago". The responsibilities of Perera were subsequently divided among the remaining MPs of Aljunied GRC. While Perera was later seen at multiple PSP events sometime in January 2025, he subsequently confirmed his residency in
New York City, implying that it was unlikely for him to contest in the election; PSP also confirmed that Perera was not one of their members. On 19 March 2024, Singh was charged in court for two counts on falsely testifying to a parliamentary committee in relation to Raeesah Khan's mishandling of a case dating back to November 2021; he took a four-week adjournment to engage a lawyer prior to a pre-trial, which was held on April 17. He remained an MP while on trial. The other WP member involved,
Faisal Manap, was not charged. On 17 February 2025, Singh was found guilty for these charges and given a $7,000 fine for both counts, though he had since lodged for an appeal. Singh retained his parliamentary seat and eligibility for elections as his two fines could not be combined to meet the minimum $10,000 fine (alternatively, a prison sentence of at least one year) for disqualification from elections. His appeal was dismissed on 4 December. On 3 November 2022, a three-minute trailer on a documentary film titled
Hougang was uploaded on their YouTube page to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the party's founding. A full video of the documentary was released exactly two years later in November 2024. The end of the film was dedicated to party pioneer Lim Ee Ping, who died of cancer on 29 May 2024 prior to the release.
2025–present: WP after Low's retirement and end of Khan's saga on 24 April. Ahead of the
2025 Singaporean general election, on 7 December 2024, Low announced that he would retire from politics but would remain a member of the party's central executive committee, despite initially expressing interest for a return. In a recent CEC update on 30 June 2024, former MP
Lee Li Lian, who was working as a councilor in Sengkang Town Council at the time, was reinstated into the CEC after a three-year absence. After the
release of new electoral boundaries, there was heavy speculation that the Workers' Party would contest around 30 seats; while the party did not confirm this, there had been heavy speculation that the party would contest
Tampines GRC and the carved-out
Tampines Changkat SMC as well as two other newly created constituencies,
Marine Parade–Braddell Heights GRC and
Punggol GRC. On 15 April, WP unveiled their manifesto titled "Working for Singapore". On 17 April, Singh said the party would contest less than a third of 97 parliamentary seats, less than the party's medium-term objective to win one-third of the seats in parliament; it was ultimately revealed that WP would contest 26 seats. On nomination day, all but one previously existing MP remained in the team for their wards, the exception was
Faisal Manap, who would contest
Tampines GRC in a rare four-cornered fight against the PAP, the
NSP and the
People's Power Party (PPP). Former Marine Parade GRC candidate
Fadli Fawzi and newcomer
Kenneth Tiong were fielded in Aljunied GRC alongside the incumbents (other than Faisal), while newcomer and AHTC property manager
Abdul Muhaimin was fielded in Sengkang GRC alongside the incumbents. However, the WP eventually did not contest Marine Parade–Braddell Heights GRC, citing limited resources and the extensive re-drawing of electoral boundaries in the area. This resulted in a
walkover for the PAP team, an occurrence last seen in 2011 with Tanjong Pagar GRC; this also attracted controversy and reactions from other opposition parties, who believed that every seat should be contested. WP responded to the controversy afterwards, stating that while they respected the views of the other opposition parties, they made decisions in the same "enlightened self-interest" as those parties. On 30 April, leaked screenshots of
Telegram messages displayed
Jalan Kayu SMC candidate
Andre Low using profanities while criticising the civil service and several brands; he apologised thereafter. The 2025 general election saw the WP managing to retain all three of its constituencies despite a major national swing towards the PAP against non-WP opposition parties. While the WP saw a slight decline of 0.44% in the overall contested vote share, the party increased their overall popular vote to almost 15%. The party was narrowly defeated in Jalan Kayu SMC and Tampines GRC, garnering 48.53% and 47.37% of the votes respectively, and offered NCMP seats as a result of the close margins. These were respectively taken by
Andre Low and
Eileen Chong on 19 May 2025. With that, the WP once again became the only opposition party in Parliament since 2020. On 14 January 2026, more than one month after Singh's appeal was dismissed,
Leader of the House Indranee Rajah filed a
motion to declare Singh unsuitable as opposition leader and seek recommendations on whether his role should be rescinded. The motion was unanimously passed by the legislature, save for all 11 WP MPs present. This was despite the party
whip being lifted; Chong, being absent, did not vote. Prime Minister
Lawrence Wong subsequently stripped Singh's position on the following day, inviting the WP to nominate a replacement. However, Singh remained an MP and vowed to continue serving Singaporeans after the verdict. Shortly after the announcement, WP launched a campaign hashtag #wecontinue, to continue efforts for outreach and support. After deliberation, the WP rejected the offer through its website on 21 January, claiming that the leader of the largest opposition party in Parliament was themself the leader of the opposition. In response, the
Prime Minister's Office (PMO) announced on the same day that it had accepted the rejection and that the position would remain vacant until the party was "ready to nominate someone to take on the responsibility". Prior to Singh's removal of the position, WP CEC convened an internal disciplinary panel on 3 January,, with the panel revealed on 20 January, which comprises Sengkang GRC MPs He, Lim, and former Hougang SMC MP
Png Eng Huat. Investigations completed on 4 April with the report handed over to the CEC, while a notice to the special cadre members' conference was expecting for release in two weeks. On 1 May, the committee found Singh that there was a contravention of Articles 20(1) and 30 of the Party Constitution, but without any intention, and was issued a formal
letter of reprimand. ==Ideology==