In January, the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) teased a potential candidate for the upcoming general election (GE): Deryne Sim, a media and entertainment lawyer who also happens to be a key figure in Singapore’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) movement. Before serving as the executive director of Same But Different, a community group providing legal information to the LGBTQ community, she was a member of the organising committee for Pink Dot SG, which organises the eponymous annual pride parade.

Sim may be the first openly queer political aspirant in Singapore. The last known queer political candidate is Vincent Wijeysingha, formerly with the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP). Wijeysingha was outed by his PAP opponents, led by Vivian Balakrishnan, now minister for foreign affairs, less than a fortnight before Polling Day in the 2011 GE. Over the past 14 years, then, the PAP has gone from ostensibly exploiting its opponent’s sexual orientation for perceived political gain to now possibly fielding its own queer candidate. 

The PAP’s most notable progressive achievement in terms of LGBTQ equality was its decision to repeal section 377A of the Penal Code, which criminalised sexual relations between men, in 2022. At the same time, however, the ruling party inserted article 156 in the constitution. This prevents the courts from overturning laws and policies that discriminate against LGBTQ people, in the name of protecting the institution of marriage. According to the PAP, elected representatives are better placed than unelected judges to deal with sensitive and controversial issues like the legalisation of same-sex marriage. 

What impact might queer issues and candidates have on the upcoming election? As evidenced by Jom’s voter sentiment survey, the subject is far less politically pressing for the majority of voters, who are typically more concerned with traditional “bread-and-butter” issues, such as cost-of-living and housing. That said, there are segments, like the youth, who place a relatively higher premium on it. Furthermore, Singaporeans are rarely single-issue voters, and a candidate’s sexual orientation (or position on LGBTQ issues) may inform how they vote in different ways.

These developments are, of course, not surprising—and point to the fundamental problem with democracy: the tyranny of the (conservative) majority. The Americans learnt this the hard way with the American Civil War, and devised a constitutional solution: the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution. In particular, the Equal Protection Clause guarantees the equal protection of the laws to all persons. 

The idea that judges had a constitutional duty to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority was succinctly captured in Justice Harlan F Stone’s famous Footnote 4 in the decision of US v. Carolene Products Co: “Prejudice against discrete and insular minorities may be a special condition, which tends seriously to curtail the operation of those political processes ordinarily to be relied upon to protect minorities, and which may call for a correspondingly more searching judicial inquiry.”

This notion that minorities deserve constitutional protection was incorporated in the Singapore Constitution when we became an independent nation. Article 12 states that all persons are equal before the law and are entitled to the equal protection of the law. Yet, by ousting the courts’ role in upholding the constitution, article 156 has effectively stripped queer people of their constitutional rights and placed them at the mercy of the conservative majority and their elected representatives.

Singaporeans’ apparent conservatism on queer rights must be contextualised. Like elsewhere, movement along the arc of justice is clear (if a little sluggish, compared to other societies). For instance, a majority of Singaporeans surveyed last year said same-sex couples should at least be allowed to obtain legal recognition, if not marry; just over a fifth were unsure; and only a quarter were against any form of marriage or legal recognition.

Perhaps then, PAP had intended Sim’s potential candidacy to appeal to the better angels of our nature and disprove critics of article 156. If Sim is elected, it may suggest that the political system is working because it means that Singapore’s voters are reasonable enough to vote for the best candidates. After all, beyond her queer activism, Sim is a successful lawyer, and recipient of the prestigious Chevening and Fulbright scholarships from the UK and US governments respectively. 

Would the election of an openly queer politician mean that all is well for queer people in Singapore? Probably not. For one, given the nature of the group representation constituency (GRC) system, Sim would likely be a relative light-weight in a team headed by an anchor minister, perhaps K Shanmugam, minister for law and home affairs. Earlier this year, she accompanied him on a walkabout in his Nee Soon district. It’s entirely possible that some will vote for Shanmugam’s team despite, and not because of, her. 

Moreover, more representation is not necessarily meaningful; nor does it have to lead to salutary reform. For example, a 2019 study found that while racial minority members of Parliament (MPs) asked questions related to race almost twenty times more often than Chinese MPs, such questions made up only one percent of all parliamentary questions. This was attributed, in part, to the fact that racial minority MPs may alienate Chinese voters if they’re perceived as only representing racial minority interests. Similarly, even if Sim were elected, she will probably shy away from issues affecting the queer community. The impact of her election as an MP would likely be limited to increasing queer visibility—changing hearts and minds, but not (directly) laws or policies. 

The queer community in Singapore is in a tough situation. On the one hand, it can no longer turn to the courts to vindicate constitutional rights that are violated by homophobic government policies. On the other hand, unless a majority of Singaporeans come around on queer equality, most politicians will not stick their heads out for the community at the possible expense of alienating voters. 

This reality revealed itself recently during the parliamentary debate over the Workplace Fairness Act, which excludes protection for queer workers from workplace discrimination on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity. While a handful of MPs called out this explicit exclusion, the government rejected it because the question of whether LGBTQ persons should be legally protected from discrimination at the workplace was allegedly too “complex and multi-faceted”. 

As the next GE looms, queer and allied voters may find themselves in a difficult position now that the PAP has made LGBTQ rights an issue at the ballot box by teasing Sim’s potential candidacy. All this may ultimately be to the detriment of the queer community, considering that no political party has articulated a clear and unequivocal commitment to queer equality. After all, the PAP that may field an openly queer candidate is also the PAP that deprived queer people of the ability to vindicate their constitutional rights through the courts. 

Similarly, the Workers’ Party (WP) has no coherent position on the issue. Three of its elected MPs, namely Gerald Giam, Dennis Tan and Faisal Manap, opposed the repeal of section 377A, citing their religious beliefs; while the rest voted in favour. Meanwhile, two of the latter group, He Ting Ru and Sylvia Lim, were the only MPs to abstain from the marriage constitutional amendment vote because of their concern with the curtailment of judicial oversight over the other two branches of government. 

Arguably, the most fascinating political dynamic triggered by Sim’s appearance is the impact it might have on cleaving the WP along its (plainly obvious) conservative-progressive line. If the GE produces any evidence at all that LGBTQ bigotry resonates with the electorate—say, an impressive performance by Goh and the PPP—then it may strengthen the hand of the WP’s conservative lobby, in an era of intensifying competition both within and between opposition parties. 

Of course, another possible scenario is that the PAP decides not to risk fielding Sim. Interestingly, at a walkabout in late March, in response to questions from reporters about Sim and other new faces, Shanmugam reminded reporters not to assume that they are all potential candidates.

The legislative repeal of section 377A, and introduction of article 156, may have contributed to a growing consciousness over the potential role that electoral politics can play in the pursuit of queer justice. However, it would be a mistake to think that politicians can or will lead us towards a more inclusive future. As American activist Rebecca Solnit writes in her book Hope In The Dark, “How the transformation happened is rarely remembered, in part because it’s compromising: it recalls the mainstream when the mainstream was… rabidly homophobic… in a way it no longer is; and it recalls that power comes from the shadows and the margins, that our hope is in the dark around the edges, not the limelight of center stage.”

Indeed, the queer community in Singapore has gotten this far not because the political elite changed their minds one day and decided to decriminalise homosexuality. Instead, the progress we have achieved so far is the result of the tireless and thoughtful activism of community organisers, movement leaders and public interest lawyers. While there may be new allies and opportunities to hasten the pace of change, the next chapter of queer Singapore must be written by ourselves.

A lawyer and social justice advocate, Daryl Yang co-founded the Inter-University LGBT Network and has consulted for both Singaporean and international human rights groups, including AWARE, ILGA World and ILGA Asia. 

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