GE2025: Pritam Singh says SM Lee may have 'forgotten' Workers' Party's position on Income-Allianz deal

SINGAPORE: Workers' Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh on Monday (Apr 28) countered comments by Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong on the opposition party's position on the aborted Income-Allianz deal, saying that Mr Lee may have only wanted "to present one side of the facts".

Speaking to the media on the sidelines of a Tampines GRC walkabout, Mr Singh said there was "good reason" recorded on the parliament Hansard why his party had abstained from voting on an Amendment Bill to block the merger.

"Maybe the Senior Minister has forgotten about it ... but I think that answer is very clear on the Hansard, and I invite the media to actually look at that answer."

At a rally on Sunday, Mr Lee said the WP had "nothing to do with" the blocking of the deal when parliament passed the legislation in October, as its MPs had abstained from voting on the changes.

During the debate then, WP's Sengkang Member of Parliament He Ting Ru said the party supported the government's blocking of the proposed acquisition in its current form on "public interest grounds based on publicly available information", and would not reject the Bill.

"However, we believe that the downsides to whether this Bill will be seen to be rushed and retrospective legislation-making, and this assault on legal and regulatory certainty that changing legislation in the middle of a major live transaction means that we would need to register our abstention on this Bill," she added.

Later that day, WP echoed her points in a Facebook post, adding that it questions whether the amendments, proposed under a certificate of urgency, were necessary. 

The deal, first announced in July last year, would have resulted in German insurer Allianz acquiring a 51 per cent stake in Income Insurance for about S$2.2 billion (US$1.6 billion).

It triggered a public outcry over whether Income would be able to continue its social mission. 

The Singapore government then blocked the deal in October, with Culture, Community and Youth Minister Edwin Tong saying it was deemed not to be in the public interest.

Allianz eventually withdrew its offer to acquire Income in December.

SM LEE "SIDESTEPPED ISSUE"

On Sunday night, Mr Lee also addressed a point made by Mr Singh at a rally earlier in the week, that not a single labour MP had raised the issue in parliament.

The Senior Minister said it was understandable why they did not do so, as the deal was initially seen as reasonable by the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC).

Mr Lee also said Mr Singh had failed to mention that six non-labour People's Action Party MPs had asked questions about the deal.

Only one WP member filed a question about it, he pointed out, referring to Ms He.

Responding to this on Monday, Mr Singh said Mr Lee had "sidestepped" the issue that no labour MP spoke up about the deal.

The WP secretary-general added: "It puts into perspective the ratio of how many PAP MPs there are in parliament, and how many Workers' Party MPs there are in parliament. The ratio isn't one is to six, it's closer to one is to nine.

"And that's something that the voters have to think about very carefully, because even if you look at the entire slate, there are 26 candidates that the Workers' Party has put forward," said Mr Singh.

"If Singaporeans vote all these candidates into parliament, the ratio is  ... closer to three to nine. Government has enough space, enough leeway, enough focus to deal with the issues of today. "

Later, WP chair Sylvia Lim also spoke on the issue, saying the party had to abstain because it values parliament as a "check" on government actions.

"To suddenly change the law to affect a live transaction, this, business certainty-wise, is actually not good for Singapore," she said.

"In parliament, actually there's a procedure for this, meaning that if a law is going to affect parties in a live transaction, the logical and the right thing to do is to send the Bill to Select Committee to hear from the parties that are affected as to how this law will actually jeopardise or undermine them before we pass the law."