PAP announces central executive committee line-up ahead of GE2025

The ruling People's Action Party (PAP) elected its 38th central executive committee (CEC) today (Nov. 24).

The CEC, the party's leadership, is determined by biennial internal elections.

The 38th CEC will steer the party from 2025 to 2026 and lead the PAP into the next general election, which must be held by November 2025.

Members of the CEC

Here are the members of the 38th PAP CEC. The order of names is not according to the number of votes received:

1. Lawrence Wong

2. Lee Hsien Loong

3. Heng Swee Keat

4. Chan Chun Sing

5. Masagos Zulkifli

6. K Shanmugam

7. Grace Fu

8. Desmond Lee

9. Edwin Tong

10. Indranee Rajah

11. Ong Ye Kung

12. Vivian Balakrishnan

13. Chee Hong Tat (co-opted)

14. Tan See Leng (co-opted)

Chee Hong Tat has newly joined the CEC, having been co-opted.

The rest of the 13 announced members had either been elected or co-opted in the previous 2022 CEC election.

Tan See Leng and Chee got the 13th and 14th highest number of votes (not necessarily in that order).

Edwin Tong had previously been co-opted into the CEC back in 2022, but has now joined the top 12 vote-getters.

How the election works

The CEC consists of not more than 18 members, of whom 12 are voted in at the biennial party conference.

The CEC, however, has the power to co-opt up to six more members to join the committee.

Typically, the secretary-general will co-opt the members who, while not directly elected, received the next two highest votes.

Subsequently, the members of the CEC will elect, from amongst themselves, the office-bearers for the posts of Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Secretary-General, Assistant Secretary-General, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer and other posts. 

SM Lee to step down, PM Wong to take over

While the exact appointments of the CEC have yet to be announced, Senior Minister (SM) Lee Hsien Loong announced in a speech on Nov. 24 that he would be stepping down as secretary-general, after 20 years of stewarding the PAP.

"Today is also a significant milestone for me: this is my last speech to the party conference as secretary-general," SM Lee said, to a crowd of over 3,000 party members, including members from the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC).

While Prime Minister (PM) Lawrence Wong will be taking over as secretary-general, SM Lee noted that he will continue to serve in the CEC in a "supporting and advisory role".

"With your support, I will lead the PAP into the next general election," PM Wong said to strong applause from the crowd.

Top photo from Aiman Nadzri.