Partyforumseasia: Three political parties have made it into Singapore’s Parliament: The dominant PAP with 80 seats, the biggest opposition Workers’ Party (WP) with 7elected and 2 non-constituency (NC) seats (which are given to the best losers), and the Singapore People’s Party with one non-constituency seat. There are ten other active parties and twenty-two are registered but not active.
On this background of a splintered opposition camp which had problems in past elections to avoid three- and more cornered fights instead of uniting against the PAP, it certainly needs optimism to start a new party from scratch.

Tan Jee Say is the man behind this new party founded in May 2014 and registered three months later under the name Singaporeans First or Singfirst in short. Tan is a former civil servant (principal private secretary to PM Goh Chok Tong). He had a short stint in the Singapore Democratic Party, and lost the 2011 presidential election as third of three candidates with 25% of the votes. According to the party’s website (link here: Singfirst.org) Tan Jee Say is the secretary-general, chairman is psychiatrist Dr. Ang Yong Guan, a schoolmate of Tan in the elitist Raffles Institution. 
Under the headline “Chairman says fear no more” Ang explains that Singfirst had to be established because he thinks that the PAP has deviated from the old successful course: “The old service-driven people-connected PAP was able to deliver and people did not mind the tough policies it implemented. Singaporeans were prepared to tolerate living in a nation that is largely apolitical but economically vibrant. (…) The emergence of the new PAP in recent years driven by profits, obsessed with economic growth and disconnected from the people has led to complacency at the top and anger and helplessness on the ground.”
Since Dr. Ang is giving a glimpse into his own political experience as a (PAP??) community leader from 1988 to 2004 and in close cooperation with former foreign minister George Yeo, there may be some space for speculation about different views inside the ruling party and what the establishment of Singaporeans First might mean for the next election, due latest by January 2017.
Partyforumseasia has a little doubt about the expressed intention to find common ground with the other opposition parties. It did not work well among the older opposition parties so far. The choice of the party’s name, though, which sounds somewhat anti-immigrant if not xenophobic, might resonate with the many Singaporeans who resent the pressure created by more than a million foreign workers in the city republic.

PS: Singapore’s “The Online Citizen” (link here) asks what Singfirst can possibly do in Tanjong Pagar, a constituency dominated by Lee Kuan Yew himself since 1955!!! Lee is 91 already and will most probably not run again. With him on the team of candidates no party contested there, providing the PAP with a comfortable “walkover”. See the following chart from The Online Citizen: