Reason for optimism

For all the PAP's grandstanding about forging a more open society, even oblique political criticism still warrants severe reprisals. Singapore's first family has a long history of filing crippling criminal defamation suits against feisty journalists and opposition politicians, including most recently a libel suit threat against the Singapore Democratic Party related to its allegations of a government cover-up of corruption at the National Kidney Foundation.

The local news media are renowned for their world-class self-censorship. Big foreign news agencies, which for years through their reporting had challenged then-prime minister Lee Kwan Yew's less-than-democratic credentials, have in recent years also been cowed by the threat of litigation and now regularly report glowingly on his economic accomplishments.

The time has come for Singapore to open up more. More freedom to the opposition is how Singapore turns into a full fledged democracy. That will close the door on criticism about lack of freedom or full democracy there; and keep people fully happy and contended.

It is notable that the younger Lee is mindful of this, as is seen from his statement after the ruling party's fresh mandate for another term. "We have a lot to work ahead of us...I want to continue to encourage open, serious debate on issues as neither the PAP, nor the government, nor the opposition has all the solutions and answers to all the questions and all the problems".

The younger Lee is obviously between a rock and a hard place. His PAP advisers are cognizant of the economic importance of more openness, but at the same time fret about the potential repercussions if the PAP loosens its political grip too fast. Judging by the proliferating number of Singapore-based blogs, however, a new, Internet-savvy generation of voters has already reached a critical mass and is less satisfied to wander aimlessly around the mall while the PAP unilaterally handles the rest of Singapore's business.

For the first time in years, Singapore has a group of better-organized, forward-looking alternative candidates to the PAP that, among other things, are trying to leverage rather than restrain the democratizing force of the Internet for political change.