SINGAPORE — With waiting times to pay their final respects to the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew at Parliament House stretching as long as eight hours, the police have advised members of the public against joining the queues.

As the authorities extended visiting hours to Parliament House to 24 hours daily from today (March 25) until Saturday 8pm, the police also began moving in to merge the long, convoluted queue that was snaking around Raffles Place and onto Circular Road.

Around 3.30pm, police officers were seen putting up police tape to prevent people from joining the lines, and leading people from the area to join the line at Hong Lim Park. Announcements were also made via loudspeakers asking people to move to Hong Lim.

By 3.40pm, Circular Road, which had been jammed with with people earlier, was clear.

In a statement released at about 1.25pm today (March 25), the police said: “We seek the understanding of members of public to remain orderly and be patient, and to follow the directions of the marshals on the ground.”

Around Parliament House, the line near the Supreme Court was also halted temporarily for the police to clear the congestion that was forming due to the stream of people exiting Parliament House.

Within Parliament House itself, the groups being let in for walkthrough to pay their last respects to Mr Lee have also grown in size, from about 20 to 30 per group in the morning, to 50 and bigger in the afternoon.