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‘Incongruous’ to defer EP changes until after next presidential election

SINGAPORE — It would be “incongruous” to call for changes to the Elected Presidency and then ask for it to be deferred until after the next presidential election — due by August 2017 — said the Constitutional Commission, in response to suggestions that any changes to qualification criteria for presidential candidates be deferred.

2011 presidential candidates during MediaCorp's Meet The Candidates programme. TODAY file photo

2011 presidential candidates during MediaCorp's Meet The Candidates programme. TODAY file photo

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SINGAPORE — It would be “incongruous” to call for changes to the Elected Presidency and then ask for it to be deferred until after the next presidential election — due by August 2017 — said the Constitutional Commission, in response to suggestions that any changes to qualification criteria for presidential candidates be deferred.

This issue had cropped up during the public hearings on the EP held by the commission earlier this year, with Singapore Management University law professor Eugene Tan proposing that any changes should come into effect only after the next presidential election that is due next year.

Assoc Prof Tan had said “the process of putting in the changes matters as much as the changes themselves”, and implementing the changes later would prevent the presidential election from being unnecessarily politicised.

Assoc Prof Tan had also said in written submissions that “changing the rules of the game so late in the presidential electoral cycle would upset legitimate expectations ... (and) unnecessarily politicise the election for a non-partisan office”, especially when the Government had between 2011 and 2015 to review the elected presidency.

Also calling for a deferment in implementing changes were Mr Ravi Philemon, lead editor of socio-political website The Independent Singapore, and Mr Chan Kai Yan, both of whom made written submissions to the commission.

In its report released yesterday, the nine-member commission countered that the question of whether and when any amendment is introduced is “a political matter” to be decided by Parliament.

“Moreover, the commission observes that it would be incongruous for it to conclude that changes are called for to safeguard the nation’s vital interests, but for it then to propose, in the same report, that these changes be deferred for at least seven years,” it said. TOH EE MING

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