GE2020: The quiet men of the Worker's Party making up for lost time in Aljunied GRC

And the duo have been given a huge remit for the 2020 General Electiono . They are replacing two party stalwarts as candidates for Aljunied GRC – charismatic former party chief Low Thia Khiang, 63, and one-time star candidate and would-be party leader Chen Show Mao, 59.

Asked about the perception that he and Giam are the quiet men of the party, Perera said with a smile, “Being loud and thumping the table is not necessarily the most effective way to bring progress in politics for the country.” He pointed to his and Giam’s record of speaking up in Parliament. From 2011-15, Giam filed 150 parliamentary questions, while Perera has also engaged in numerous Parliamentary debates.

However, both Low and Png have been actively campaigning alongside the Aljunied team. By contrast, Chen has been conspicuously absent from the campaign trail, though his social media posts show that he remains active with the party behind the scenes. WP’s Chinese voter baseThe absence of Low, Chen and Png – the latter has been replaced by Dennis Tan in Hougang SMC – means that the party has lost its most proficient Mandarin and dialect speakers.

And what of the optics of Low and Png continuing to campaign for the party? On Thursday, when Low walked Kovan Market, he was greeted by residents like a rock star. “Of course, their proficiency in the language is very, very high, and they are almost part of the furniture in Aljunied and Hougang. They’ve been there for some time, they are extremely well known.”The value of social mediaIn the 2020 campaign, the WP’s social media strategy has impressed, with slickly produced videos and posts.

And when asked about a meme circulating that claimed Lim would have received flak instead of praise if he were a PAP candidate, Perera responded, “What probably impressed people is the conviction and the passion, not just the eloquence or the policy knowledge. I think if a PAP candidate can show that kind of sincerity, conviction, that kind of passion... it's hard to fake these things... unless you’re a very experienced kind of con artist, in most cases, people can tell.

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