Top photo by Lim Weixiang for Mothership.sg.

Three Non-Constituency MP seats have been offered to Lee Li Lian, Dennis Tan, and Leon Perera, a member of the party's East Coast GRC team, according to Channel NewsAsia.

The Elections Department (ELD) earlier wrote to the Workers' Party (WP) with the offer, which the party has until next Tuesday, September 22, to confirm to take up.

So far, Lee confirmed she will not accept her NCMP seat. She made this decision shortly after the Punggol East result was announced on Polling Day.

Workers' Party statement: Yes to Tan, Perrera, and we put forward Goh as reserve

In a statement released on its website on Wednesday evening, WP's Central Executive Council (CEC) said they agreed with Lee’s decision not to accept the NCMP position, as well as with Tan’s move to accept his.

As the ELD said in its statement, the party confirmed its nomination of Leon Perera as their East Coast representative to take up their team's NCMP slot.

At the same time, they moved to put forward Perera's teammate Daniel Goh for the third slot, vacated by Lee, provided Parliament votes to fill it.

How the opposition's best losers did in the election:

Lee, 37, lost the single-seat ward at the Sept. 11 General Election to the People's Action Party's Charles Chong after receiving 48.2 percent of the vote.

Tan, 45, lost in Fengshan to the PAP's Cheryl Chan with 42.5 percent of the vote.

The WP's team in East Coast GRC received 39.3 per cent of the vote against a PAP team led by Manpower Minister Lim Swee Say.

The four East Coast GRC candidates are: IT consultant Gerald Giam, 37; consultancy firm chief executive Leon Perera, 44; sociology don Daniel Goh, 42; and former librarian Mohamed Fairoz Shariff, 36.

But constitution law experts remain divided on the fate of the third NCMP seat, now that Lee has rejected it.

Constitutional law expert Kevin Tan told The Straits Times that his reading of Article 39 of the Constitution and of Section 52 of the Parliamentary Elections Act obliges Parliament to have three NCMPs for this term.

Another expert, former Nominated MP Thio Li-Ann, however, told The Straits Times that Parliament may opt to leave the seat vacant.

Thio said. "Parliament may then either say the seat shall remain vacant, or that it will go to the next-best performer."

That candidate is WP's Sengkang West candidate Koh Choong Yong, the best performer after Lee, Tan, and the East Coast team. Koh, 42, lost to the PAP's Lam Pin Min with 37.9 per cent of the votes.

Now this leaves us slightly confused. Does the party actually have a choice of who they can put up for the vacated NCMP position? Or does it have to go to Koh?

Guess we'll find out soon enough.

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