Why East Coast GRC will remain tightly contested

 I predict that East Coast GRC will remain tightly contested. This is based on various factors.

1. East Coast GRC has a history of PAP polling below national average. East Coast GRC now consisists of Bedok, Changi-Simei, Fengshan, Kampong Chai Chee and Siglap-Joo Chiat, The historical results are as follows: 

  • East Coast GRC 2020 GE (PAP 53.39% vs WP 46.61%)
  • East Coast GRC 2015 GE (PAP 60.73% vs WP 39.27%)
  • East Coast GRC 2011 GE (PAP 54.8% vs WP 45.2%)
  • East Coast GRC 2006 GE (PAP 63.9% vs WP 36.1%)
  • Fengshan SMC 2015 GE (PAP 57.5% vs WP 42.5%)
  • Joo Chiat SMC 2011 GE (PAP 51.02% vs WP 48.98%)
  • Joo Chiat SMC 2006  GE (PAP 65.01% vs WP 34.99%)

2. There is a relatively high proportion of private housing dwellers in East Coast GRC. 49.3% of East Coast residents live in private housing. This is the second highest (behind Tanjong Pagar GRC). And in general, when a constituency has more private homes, the constituency tend to be less pro-PAP. This is because for many private home dwellers such as condo owners, town council issues do not bother them. The maintenance of their condo is not under the ambit of the town council. And hence, when they are electing an MP, they tend to focus more on parliamentary performance and national issues rather than municipal issues.

3. Constituency boundary change does not introduce new voters to WP. In the latest redelineation exercise, East Coast GRC added 40,675 people from Marine Parade GRC. These voters come from public housing blocks in Chai Chee and private estates in Joo Chiat. In addition, 12,871 voters from the largely private residential areas Changi area were carved out. All in all, the constituents in East Coast GRC are voters that WP have so-called walked the ground in before.

4. Other factors that may favour the opposition. These include:
- The brand factor of WP. Amongst the various opposition parties, WP is better regarded and has better brand recognition due to its long history. In GE2020, WP won 10 seats (5M Aljunied GRC, 4M Sengkang GRC and Hougang SMC). The average contested vote share for the WP in GE2020 is 50.5%, higher than national average.
- National issues such as the GST increases and the associated cost of living increases tend to favour the opposition based on history.
- New PM effect, whereby the PAP loses votes each time a new PM takes office tend to favour the opposition based on history.

5. Factors that might favour the PAP
- The boundary changes might have boosted the PAP chances by a little bit.. The proportion of 1 to 3 room HDB houses have slightly increased, whilst the 4/5/Executive HDB have slightly decreased. The private housing proportion have remained relatively constant.

5. Other Factors that can swing both ways
- Both sides are fielding old and new faces. For the PAP, they are fielding incumbents Edwin Tong, Tan Kiat How and Jessica Tan and new faces Dinesh Vasu Dash, Hazlina Abdul Halim. For the WP, they are fielding experienced candidates Yee Jenn Jong, Nathaniel Koh and new faces Paris V. Parameswari, Sufyan Mikhail Putra and Jasper Kuan. Some of the candidates, such as Mr Yee Jenn Jong is a local boy.


My conclusion:

I think that East Coast GRC will be a close contest and the WP might just be fifth time lucky and eke out a win come election night.

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