2015 has been a year of excitement and election - and if you found 2014 boring, 2015 was definitely exciting, what with the election, lawsuits, and SG50.

Here are 15 figures that have been on the news, ranging from the boring to the obscure.

1. Economy: 2 or "close to 2", the Government's official forecast for growth.

The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) will release the advance estimates for Singapore's gross domestic product (GDP) for the fourth quarter and the full-year 2015 tomorrow (Jan 4).

The MTI expects the economy to grow by ‘close to 2.0’ in 2015, with growth being weighed down primarily by the weak performance of manufacturing.

MTI expected the economy to grow at a modest pace of between "1.0 to 3.0 percent" next year.

2. Babies: 30,500 - the total number born as of Dec 1.

SG50 is proving to bring in a bumper crop of babies this year, with 30,500 born before December 1. If the births in December breach the 3,000 mark, it would break the 2014 total of 33,193 babies born.

All this might prove that the SG50 baby fanfare yielded good results.

Other than the Baby Jubilee Gift for SG50 babies, an additional round of perks - known as the Jubilee Marriage and Parenthood package, which includes an extra $2,000 in the Baby Bonus, an additional week in paternity leave and $1,000 more in Medisave grants for newborns.

3. Lee Kuan Yew: 91 

91 year old Lee passed away on 23 March this year. The 7-day mourning period saw 454,687 people visiting Parliament House where he lay in state with an average of 6,500 visitors per hour; 1.1 million opted to visit the 18 community tribute sites around Singapore.

Lee’s cortege was taken on a gun carriage via a 15.4 km route to the National University of Singapore. In total, 1.5 million people paid their last respects during the mourning period.

4. General Election: 69.86% 

That is the percentage of Singaporeans who voted for the ruling People's Action Party (PAP).

It’s the new number everyone, from your average Facebook commenter to maybe even your anti-establishment aunt, is getting hung up about.

Sep 11 is a number and date in their minds as the PAP won 83 out of the 89 seats contested, with the Workers’ Party losing Punggol East and barely retaining the rest.

181 candidates contested for 89 seats, making this year’s election the most contested since 1963. All in all, over 1.5 million voted for the PAP, with the opposition getting 680,232 votes. 205,910 voters either ruined their votes or didn’t vote at all.

If you haven’t gotten enough of election fever, you’ll probably have to wait - it may be 604 days (from 30 Dec, deduct if necessary) till the next Presidential Election. Will the vote be split between four Tans?

5. Amos Yee: Four weeks

The YouTube blogger, who posted an eight minute long video ridiculing Lee and a lewd depiction of Lee and former UK PM Margret Thatcher on his blog, was sentenced to four weeks' jail, and walked away from the courts on Jul 6.

The 17-year-old was earlier held in remand for five weeks while drama played out in the courts and online, as Yee repeatedly sought to put up the offending video clip and caricatures despite court orders to take them down.

6. CPF blogger Roy Ngerng: $150,000

$150,000 in damages was awarded to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong this year after a three-day trial.

During the trial, Ngerng asked PM Lee a lot of questions and was returned the favour by Davinder Singh, PM Lee’s counsel.

Ngerng, who later joined the Reform Party to run against PM Lee, had been found guilty of defamation in a summary judgement issued in November 2014, for comparing a chart detailing the relationship between Kong Hee and City Harvest Church leaders and PM Lee with the Central Provident Fund, state sovereign wealth fund GIC and his cabinet members.

The only thing that "saved him"? His own lack of standing, according to Justice Lee Seiu Kin.

7. Pastor Kong Hee: sentenced to 8 years in jail

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="639"] Source[/caption]

The one and a half year-long trial for misuse of church funds by the City Harvest Church (CHC) leadership led to six of its leaders being convicted of between three and 10 counts of criminal breach of trust and falsifying accounts.

The leadership was accused of misappropriating $24 million, putting them into fake investments that funded Sun Ho’s career. A further $26 million was used to hide the fake investments.

As to what Kong Hee had to say after the verdict: "You have suffered much over the past few years because of your commitment to City Harvest Church... I am so sorry for all the pain and the turmoil you have had to endure under my leadership, under my watch… Pastor is so very sorry, so so sorry.”

The church experienced a 25% drop in members since 2009, in the years since the criminal probe was launched. Last year, CHC had a congregation of 17,522 - a far cry from when Charisma - a Christian publication based in the US - described CHC as ‘one of the largest and most vibrant’ in Asia.

8. Jover Chew: 25 counts of cheating

The former owner of now defunct Sim Lim electronics show Mobile Air was charged on May 29 for ‘dishonestly inducing’ customers to pay for phones they were not going to receive.

He eventually pleaded guilty to 12 charges - 10 counts of cheating, one count of criminal intimidation and another of intentional distress - and was jailed for 33 months and fined $2,000 on Nov 30.

Since Mobile Air’s closure, the number of complaints have dropped to 26 from January to November 2015, from 107 in 2014. Most complaints are now about defective goods rather than misrepresentation.

Chew and Mobile Air became infamous after videos of a crying Vietnamese tourist begging Mobile Air staff to refund his money went viral.

9. People who celebrated SG50 events during Jubilee Weekend: 1.7 million 

The four day weekend from Aug 7 to Aug 10 was littered with free stuff all over, with long queues over cable cars and for the ArtScience Museum.

A ton of other things were free too, like nine museums, a free concert featuring 100 bands, the Science Centre, as well as a variety of events at Sentosa.

Guess that is the reason why many decided not to go overseas for the long weekend.

10. Cats: 18 dead in Yishun since September

The hunt for the cat killers would go well into 2016, as more deaths have appeared despite the arrest of an alleged cat killer.

Since September, 18 cats have died, with two left severely injured. Cat welfare group Yishun 326 Tabby cat volunteers found another dead cat near 734 Yishun Avenue 5 two days before New Year.

11. $9 billion - the amount spent for the Pioneer Generation Package (PGP)

The package, which was launched in 2014, honoured Singaporeans who were born before Dec 31, 1949 and gave them health benefits.

Around 450,000 Singaporeans benefited from the package, which guaranteed 50% off services and medications at public specialist clinics and polyclinics, and gave $200 to $800 annually for life.

The PGP also guaranteed a $100 life-long cash assistance for disabled seniors.

12. Gold medals: 108

That's the total number of golds for SEA Games and ASEAN Para Games 2015.

84 gold medals were won by Singapore athletes in this year’s SEA Games, while 24 were won by Singapore in the ASEAN Para Games. Singapore broke historical records in both Games - beating our record 50 gold haul in the 1993 SEA Games, and the 15 gold haul in the 2005 ASEAN Para Games.

900 athletes participated in both games; Singapore led the largest contingent in the SEA Games with 749 athletes while 151 Singapore athletes competed in the ASEAN Para Games.

$324.5 million was spent on the SEA Games, while $75 million was budgeted on the ASEAN Para Games.

13. NUS and NTU rankings: 12 and 13

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="2362"] Source: Nanyang Chronicle[/caption]

Sep 15’s Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) rankings saw NUS rising by 10 places and NTU jumping by 26 places, surpassing Ivy League schools like Yale and Penn State. Both universities were the only Asian schools in the QS top 20, and both retained the top spots amongst the top universities in Asia.

The reason for the leap?

This year’s rankings adopted a ‘modified methodologies’, according to QS, so the British education company could have ‘fairer evaluations’ for universities that were strong in research in fields like arts, humanities and social sciences as well as engineering compared to fields like medicine.

Times Higher Education’s rankings put NUS and NTU at 25th and 55th respectively.

14. 3 hours - the time MRT services was disrupted on Jul 7

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250,000 commuters were left stranded in the biggest train disruption Singapore ever saw - caused by a shut-down of power across the two lines. An investigation found that mineral deposits on the third rail insulation caused the power system to trip.

The biggest train disruption previously was during 2011 - another election year, coincidentally - when 127,000 commuters were affected when train services went down for six hours on the North-South Line.

Since the 2011 train disruption, over 1,430 instances of train delays of more than 5 minutes were recorded. Over 50 disruptions for more than 10 minutes were recorded. LTA imposed a penalty of $5.4 million on SMRT.

15. 28,000 - the number of people at Pink Dot 2015

Pink Dot’s record breaking growth isn’t one that surprises anymore - in spite of two years of protest by a counter Wear White movement.

It is not known how many attended Ustaz Noor Deros and Pastor Lawrence Khong’s services, though the latter famously declared that his Faith Community Baptist Church “will wear white until the pink is gone”.

Over 6,400 Christians wore white in 2014, the first year Wear White movement was announced.

Top photo from Marina Bay Sands Facebook.

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