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SINGAPORE: Among Singaporeans who voted in 2020 for a party other than the one they elected in the 2015 general election, a higher percentage went from the Popular Action Party (PAP) to the opposition compared to the opposite party, according to a post-election poll by the Institute of Political Studies (IPS).
This was a reversal of the results of the 2015 poll, which found that more undecided voters switched from opposition to the PAP.
Swing voters were defined in the survey as those who voted for one party in 2015 and for another party in 2020.
Eight percent of those surveyed in this year’s poll were voters who switched from the PAP to the opposition.
Three percent of those surveyed reported a change in opposition to the PAP.
However, the results come from a small sample size, said associate professor Zhang Weiyu, who presented the findings in a forum via Facebook Live on Thursday (October 8).
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Among the more than 2,000 people surveyed, 56 percent did not respond to questions about who they voted for in either 2015 or 2020.
“Some of the numbers are quite low, especially for the category of opposition to the PAP. So we had a lot of missing data due to denials, ”he said at a press conference on Wednesday.
This was part of a larger survey IPS commissioned from YouGov. The company collected the opinions of 2,018 citizens aged 21 and over, from July 13 to 21, with the data weighted by the proportion of gender, race and age groups of Singaporeans.
DEMOGRAPHICS AND TRAITS OF SWING VOTERS
Respondents who transitioned from the PAP to the opposition in 2020 were more likely to be men, accounting for 64 percent of those surveyed.
In 2015, women were more likely to move from the PAP to the opposition, and 70% of them reported doing so.
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There were no significant differences in ethnicity, housing types, age and education in voting patterns this year compared to the proportion of these groups in Singapore’s population, according to the survey.
This was different from 2015, when a lower proportion of Chinese voters and a higher proportion of Indian voters switched from the PAP to the opposition. A higher proportion of voters living in one- or two-bedroom flats also moved from the PAP to the opposition in 2015.
Furthermore, respondents who leaned toward the opposition were more likely to have signed a petition in the past six months.
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They also joined more online rallies and are more likely to have attended opposition rallies. This is in contrast to 2015, where respondents who reported transitioning from the PAP to the opposition attended opposition rallies less.
These respondents were also less concerned about the quality of candidates, a party’s track record, and the management of the COVID-19 pandemic, but were more concerned about having different voices in Parliament. This is consistent with the 2015 findings.
“I would say that the 2020 PAP for undecided opposition voters was pretty typical,” Associate Professor Zhang said.
“They used to be men, they were also more active in politics, they relied less on newspapers and radio, and they liked having alternative views in Parliament. That was often in line with our expectations of swing voters in this country. “
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As for the respondents who went from the opposition to the PAP, they were the ones who least attended the e-rallies.
Only 20 percent of this group reported joining a rally, compared to 31 percent among non-undecided voters and 46 percent of those who switched from the PAP to the opposition.
Those who attended the rallies went to almost the same number of PAP and opposition rallies, similar to voters who are not undecided.
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This group of respondents was also more concerned with the quality of the candidates, according to the findings.
Since this was announced as an online election, with no physical rallies due to COVID-19 restrictions, all voters trusted social media to the same level, Associate Professor Zhang said.
READ: Facebook, CNA and YouTube were the channels voters turned to in the 2020 ‘online’ general election: IPS survey
This was compared to the 2015 general election, when voters who switched from the PAP to the opposition used more party sources online.
The use of the media was also at the same level among all types of voters, Associate Professor Zhang noted.
Based on the data, he added: “What really influenced a change seemed to be the reason for the vote, caring about alternative voices in Parliament, rather than the specific use of social media.”
