On July 3, a forum involving six opposition parties -- the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), Progress Singapore Party (PSP), Singapore Democratic Alliance (SDA), People's Power Party (PPP), Reform Party (RP), and Red Dot United (RDU) was held at National University of Singapore Society (NUSS), and was moderated by former Nominated Member of Parliament (NMP) Viswa Sadasivan.

One question posed to Paul Tambyah, SDP's representative, was what he thought about the population policy, specifically the 10 million figure.

Tambyah stated that SDP didn't come up with the figure, but rather it was a number by Liu Thai Ker. And that figure, according to Tambyah, was cited by The Straits Times.

"Subsequently, the figure was reported to be cited by The Straits Times, now we discover from the transcript that the number was not cited by DPM Heng at all."

ST recently came out with an article clarifying their original article.

Their starting line of the article being, "Falsehoods repeated often enough can be perceived as the truth, and there is a risk this is happening in the general election."

Here is their take on that particular portion that SDP had cited.

"Shortly after the debate ended, Dr Chee put up a Facebook post with a link to the ST article.

He highlighted two paragraphs: "Singapore's population density is not excessive, he (DPM Heng) said, noting that other cities are a lot more crowded in terms of liveable space. He cited former chief planner Liu Thai Ker, who said in 2014 that Singapore should plan for 10 million people for it to remain sustainable in the long term."

No ordinary reader of the article - let alone these sentences - would think that Mr Heng wants Singapore to plan for 10 million people."

Tambyah further stated that the figure had been discussed by Ravi Philemon from RDU, and he had also talked about how that number had been floating about "for a long time".

According to Tambyah, "all Soon Juan did was ask to say if it's real, or not real" and he got "torn apart".

Viswa then asked if better information flow by the government is necessary, which Tambyah agreed with.

PAP released two statements on population claims

The PAP has released two statements with regard to SDP, specifically with regards to Chee's claims in the debate.

While the first statement addressed SDP and called into question the party's integrity, the second statement took aim at Pritam Singh and Paul Tambyah.

The PAP expressed their surprise that SDP's chairman Paul Tambyah had backed Chee up.

The statement also criticised WP's Pritam Singh for "opportunistically" jumping into the fray.

Pritam later responded saying that he did not "jump into it", but was answering a question from the media during a doorstop.

In 2018, Minister Josephine Teo, who is in charge of population matters in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), has said in Parliament that Singapore is not expected to change its immigration policy, and its population is likely to be "significantly below" 6.9 million by 2030.

Image from NUSS YouTube