'Life is always unpredicatable': PAP’s Liang Eng Hwa on overcoming nose cancer & contesting Bukit Panjang SMC again

In the latest episode of the "Mothership Podcast with XQ", PAP’s Liang Eng Hwa sat down with our host Xing Qi to talk through his decision to contest Bukit Panjang SMC again this GE2025.

No stranger to local politics, Liang was first elected as a Member of Parliament (MP) in 2006 for the uncontested Holland-Bukit Timah GRC.

In 2020, he succeeded Teo Ho Pin as the MP for Bukit Panjang SMC, after the latter announced his retirement from politics.

During the podcast, Liang also delved into his experience of being diagnosed in late-2024 with Stage 2 nasopharyngeal cancer.

Read on for some excerpts of our conversation, or watch the full episode here:

On joining politics in 2006

What was that process like for you? Was it crazy to be facing the media and doing all these things for the first time?

It was not something that I [felt was] easy to start with.

I typically don’t speak very eloquent English — it doesn’t come naturally sometimes. [I] still get grammar problems along the way.

So in meeting the media, sometimes it can be quite a struggle in the early stage.

It was a steep learning curve for me to enter politics at the time because I’m a corporate guy — I work in the financial sector. When we communicate, it’s all straight to the point, do this, do that.

On battling nose cancer

Tell us about when you first found out about your diagnosis — how did you feel at the time?

Actually, I was quite calm at the time taking [in] the news because, typically for me, when I deal with life situations, I always prepare [for] the worst case.

And then the doctor say 'We are lining up the oncologist next door to see you. You just got to go over there. They'll tell you what to do next.'

My immediate response to him... 'Sorry, I have a meeting later.'

That’s when he scolded me and said 'You better take care of your own welfare first.'

What was it like breaking the news to your family?

They were all very stunned.

[It turned out that] we have relatives who have [had nose cancer] before and then we started to find out more — with more information you feel a lot better.

But of course, the treatment [and] the waiting does put some mental pressure on you.

You get anxiety from time to time and you kind of worry about how this will go. But along the way you just keep giving your best through the treatment.

Did surviving cancer give you a new perspective on life? Or a new perspective on politics?

[It did], not just on politics, on everything.

Definitely, this is life-changing and [those] two months of staying out of a lot of things makes you think a lot, reflect a lot and actually you also start to feel that life is always unpredictable.

There’s this impermanence part about life and therefore it’s all the more important that you do something meaningful.

[...] I just want to make sure I use whatever I have — the leverage that I have — to uplift lives, to change something, if I can, for the better, [and] make a difference.

Watch our podcast for the full conversation here: