Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam will be covering the duties of the Minister for Finance with immediate effect.

The 59-year-old served as the Minister for Finance from 2007 to 2015.

After the 2015 general election, Tharman was appointed as the Coordinating Minister for Economic and Social Policies. He remains Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore.

Tharman's notable contributions included coming up with the Resilience Package in 2009, which was delivered during the Global Financial Crisis to help Singaporeans. It was the largest basic deficit ever budgeted by the Government, at $14.9 billion, or about 6 percent of GDP.

In 2014, Tharman also delivered The Pioneer Generation Package, which set aside $8 billion to help Singapore’s first generation of pioneers pay for the cost of their health care.

Top photo from Youtube.

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