Workers' Party (WP) candidates are usually media-shy when it comes to accepting interviews with the mainstream media.

Hence, it was a surprise to see Non-Constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) Leon Perera accepting an interview with news radio 938LIVE’s Bharati Jagdish to talk about his first GE experience last year, the NCMP scheme, and the political viability of WP.

Maybe the WP is becoming less media-shy. Maybe this move shows WP's confidence in Leon as one of their next generation leaders.

Maybe Leon is plugging a new tagline for WP, for he mentioned "balanced politics" six times. Anyway, "balanced politics" sounds more similar to the more successful "First World Parliament" slogan in GE 2011 than the "Empower Your Future" slogan in 2015.

Below are the highlights of the interview:

On the biggest mistakes WP made during GE 2015...

Leon Perera: "One of the things, on reflection, that I think we could've done better is to explain more effectively the positive ideas that we had for policy, that were revealed in our manifesto. And I think that is something that we could've been more effective at doing and that's something I hope that we can do better going forward.

We had a manifesto with many positive and proactive ideas for Singapore, to make Singapore better, and some people reacted to that by saying, "This is quite technical, this quite complex, there are so many different ideas in here, we need more time to digest and process that.”

Here are three examples that reveal Leon's media-savvinesss:

1. He (or WP) is not claiming credit for PAP's policy changes after GE2011 anymore. 

Leon at first alluded to the slew of policies that took place after GE 2011 (following PAP's first loss of a GRC) - the Progressive Wage model, MediShield Life, de-linking HDB retail price from resale prices.

But he checked himself when Bharati countered that PAP said that many of these were in the works before 2011.

Bharati then went for the jugular and asked whether Leon  "maintain that the WP's presence in Parliament was the reason for the policy changes".

Here is how Leon replied:

"Not at all. I maintain that it is how people voted that led to those policy changes, and this is really the point about political balance.

It's different from just diversity. Political balance means that you have a loyal, constructive opposition that is able to win some electoral seats and because of that, a ruling party that is very strongly entrenched will need to ensure that its policies do not stray too far from the country's political centre of gravity, from what most people want...

If we have an opposition that is completely not viable, then that does not bring that kind of political balance. They may be there just to debate and express views, but that is a different thing from political balance, and it is political balance that I think is what is so vitally necessary for us now.

I think the credit for that goes to the Singaporean voters."

2. On the parliamentary super-majority held by PAP

Perera: "I think the reality is that we are vastly outnumbered, 83 to eight, and the attendance on PAP’s side of the house was very high for that particular debate, during those two hours as compared to the entire period of the last five days, when the attendance was not so high (Poking the PAP MPs' attendance in parliament, I see).

So, the numerical asymmetry is there, but I think that I expected that and I don't protest that, because that is the reality, that is the result of the electoral system so I would say no, I didn't feel ganged up on per se.

Rather, my thinking about that is this is the reality that we have to work with and we have to do our best within the framework of that reality."

3. Check out how Leon buys time for WP's position on NCMP scheme by not saying anything new yet.

When radio host Bharati asked about WP’s stance on the NCMP seats...

Perera's First Parry (Pls Refer to last week's debate): "I don't want to go into too much detail, because there was a very extensive debate in Parliament..."

Second Parry (Provide Some Context): "We have to be clear that these changes (NCMP scheme changes) are not necessarily earth-shattering. They’re increasing the number from nine to 12... The change that is being made is that they can now vote on more things."

Third Parry (Highlight WP as a constructive Opposition Party): "But I think a view is that we have to work within this system, to engage with this system. We cannot choose the political system we want to contest in and engage in".

Fourth Parry (Show that WP learn from history): "We do not want to do what the Barisan Sosialis did in the 1960s, which is disengage from the system because we feel that we disagree with it, therefore we are not going to play by these rules. We want to remain within the system and do whatever we can within that system."

But radio host Bharati was not letting Perera get away with the soft replies...

Bharati: "No one is suggesting that by not taking the seats you’d be disengaging completely, or that you have to. There are other avenues through which you can remain engaged. Your party has elected MPs in Parliament.

Even if you chose to reject the NCMP seats on principle, you have the right to stand for elections and go into Parliament as elected MPs. Some may say that the Barisan Sosialis at least appeared to stand by its principles. In your case, by accepting the NCMP seats in spite of your objections to the scheme, it looks as if you'll take whatever you can get, putting your principles aside. It might smack of desperation, even."

Perera: "I completely disagree that our stance on the NCMP scheme shows that we have no principles. I do not think that is the case at all. We have made it very clear that while we disagree in principle with the scheme, we have to consider the scheme as part of the political reality and see how we work with that reality to advance to a balanced politics. It is not a contradiction at all.

And I think the point you made about the Barisan Sosialis at least being extremely principled - well, my question is where did that get Singapore?

It may be cast by some as being an extremely principled thing, but I think it set the course of balanced politics back."

Bharati: "But you are free to work the ground and contest in elections even if you don’t accept NCMP seats".

Perera: "We have to stay engaged within that system and try to make whatever gains we can for the cause of a balanced politics. So we want to stay engaged the best we can".

Last try from Bharati: "Now, there's a proposal to give NCMPs equal powers as MPs. Some analysts are questioning how democratic this move is - to have in Parliament NCMPs who weren't elected by the majority in their constituency, who, under the proposal, will have equal voting rights as MPs. As a matter of principle, as a person who obviously supports democratic politics, do you have a separate opinion on the issue of voting rights being equal?"

Perera: "We have said that we oppose the scheme in principle, so I won't comment on whether the tweaks to the scheme are better or worse. Ultimately, those tweaks and changes are not under our control, they are decided by the ruling party. So the key point is that we have to take those changes and see how we can work within that system in order to make a contribution going forward."

You can listen to the full 27 minute interview here.

Top photo from 938Live Facebook.

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