Murali urges residents: Vote for me, no need to experiment

SINGAPORE — People’s Action Party (PAP) candidate Murali Pillai urged Bukit Batok voters to give him a “very strong mandate” in this by-election so that he can continue serving them.

Noting that he has more programmes up his sleeve to help residents, on top of the 16 existing ones, Mr Murali sought to convince voters of the PAP’s track record.

“I humbly ask for the mandate from you to carry on serving you ... ,” he said at a rally on Thursday (May 5) night, on the last day of campaigning for the by-election. “A vote for us is a vote for certainty. No need to experiment.” 

PAP has a “decided” advantage in managing the estate well, he said, pointing to the track record of Jurong-Clementi Town Council, which Bukit Batok falls under, and the economies of scale it enjoys.

Mr Murali said he entered politics because he saw first-hand how targeted help could make a positive difference in the lives of residents. “Politics is not a career for me. It is a cause. I will not be muzzled,” he added.

Besides speaking up in Parliament to push through policies, Mr Murali pledged to have strong ground-level programmes to help residents “on a real-time basis”. He cited an instance when a young resident whose father was in jail got a bursary, but activists in the ward raised money to top up the amount needed for her school fees. “If we were to wait for this matter to be raised in Parliament and then decide, our dear family here will not get any help,” he said.

Mr Murali’s party colleagues who spoke at the rally also vouched for his capability, with Chua Chu Kang GRC MP Low Yen Ling stressing his years of service in the ward. She described Mr Murali as an old friend of the ward who would care for residents in times of trouble, while Jurong GRC MP Rahayu Mahzam spoke about his substantive programmes for residents.

In his speech, Mr Murali demonstrated his familiarity with the ins and outs of the estate, paying tribute to the one-armed musician who plays national songs at the market at Block 155 and a Chinese ink painter, whose art pieces he glimpsed during a house visit.

Meanwhile, Jurong GRC MP Ang Wei Neng, along with other rally speakers, questioned the Singapore Democratic Party’s (SDP) ability to take over the running of the town council, saying that both Bukit Gombak and Nee Soon Central town councils had gone into deficit under the SDP’s watch following the 1991 election.

He also said Mr Murali had stayed on to volunteer in Aljunied GRC after losing in the polls last September, unlike the SDP which vanished from Bukit Batok SMC after last year’s General Election and reappeared during the by-election.