The Barisan Sosialis (Malay for Socialist Front; Chinese: ??????) is a former Singaporean left-wing political party formed in 1961, by left-wing members of the People's Action Party (PAP) and led by Dr Lee Siew Choh and Lim Chin Siong.

Formation

The party was formed when the leftist members of the PAP were dismissed by then party leader Lee Kuan Yew. The key event leading to the breakup was the motion of confidence of the government in which 13 PAP assemblymen crossed party lines and abstained from voting. Together with six prominent left-leaning leaders from trade unions, the breakaway members established this new party. At the time of inception, it had popular support rivalling or even superseding that of the PAP. 35 of the 51 branches of PAP and 19 of its 23 organising secretaries went to the Barisan Sosialis.

Key Developments

The leftist Barisan Sosialis was slandered by the PAP as a Communist front and attacked vehemently as being a radical pro-Communist group was emphasised when PAP member Goh Keng Swee commented on the schism (which, at the time, he clearly believed would end the PAP's dominance) in an interview with Dennis Bloodworth :

??what shook us was not that we had lost the fight to the Communists but it was done with such contemptuous ease: one flick of the hand, and we were down on the floor?.

Nevertheless many Barisan Sosialis members did have (to varying extents) admiration for Communism as well as Socialism as these were both leftist ideals; their left orientation was used by the PAP to damage their reputation and viability in the Singaporean context.

Merger Issue

Barisan Sosialis disagreed with the 1962 planned merger to form Malaysia, for two main reasons.

Firstly, it was believed that if Singapore joined the Malaysian Federation, the anti-Communist Malaysian government (UMNO) would be harsher than the pre-existent Singapore government. The merger thus aided PAP's anti-Communist intents, although both PAP and Barisan Sosialis practised socialist policies. In the referendum deciding the merger, none of three options provided for voting were against merger. The Barisan Sosialis called on its supporters to cast blank votes in protest, in which roughly 25% did. However, this was circumvented by the PAP counting all blank votes as a vote for a loosely federal autonomous position for Singapore within Malaysia.

Secondly, thy felt that Singapore's membership in the Malaysian Federation would be on unfair as Singapore-born "citizens" would be unequal with citizens in the rest of Malaysia. A clause of the White Paper of 1962 had detailed that Singapore-born "citizens" were granted automatic citizenship but had to apply for passports and other documents instead of being automatically granted them.

Cold Store and the 1963 Election

In February 1963, Operation Coldstore by the ISD caused the arrest of many Barisan Sosialis members. That notwithstanding, in the 1963 state elections, the Barisan Sosialis won 13 out of 51 seats, becoming the second largest and the leading opposition party. Nonetheless, the election results were viewed as a setback as the party had expected to win power. Also, the opposition vote was split, thus they only won 14 seats (including one from the United People's Party) despite earning 53% of popular support. After the elections, the PAP accused it of supposedly 'anti-Communist' and 'subversive' activities, and used the ISD continued arresting Barisan Sosialis members, including MPs.

One famous example is Chia Thye Poh, an MP who was imprisoned without trial in 1965 and was only released in 1998 as one of the longest-serving political prisoners in the world. Even then, his current conditions of release effectively bar him from participating in any politically-tinged activities. Chia was repeatedly and unfoundedly labelled a Communist despite his consistent denials, while his prolonged imprisonment was justified with supposed testimonies from 2 ex-members of the underground Malayan Communist Party. Nevertheless, Chia insists that he is instead a prisoner of conscience.

Decline

After Singapore's independence from Malaysia, the party's members of parliament began resigning one by one in 1966. Though the Barisan Sosialis' official position was to 'take the fight to the streets', its morale was already eroding due to its failure to stop the merger. In the by-elections for these vacant seats, the PAP had a clean sweep. Calls for blank ballots by the Barisan Sosialis went unheeded. By 1968, there was no opposition member of parliament and it was 13 years before the opposition parties won a single seat in parliament in the Anson by-election of 1981.

In an election rally in 1980, party chairman Dr Lee Siew Choh apologised to the voters for what Barisan's actions in 1966 and admitted what they had done was a grave mistake. In 1988, the Barisan Sosialis was officially dissolved and its members, led by Dr Lee Siew Choh, joined the Workers' Party of Singapore.

Notes

1. Bloodworth, Dennis. (1986). The Tiger and the Trojan Horse, Singapore: Times Books International, 1986.

Further reading

Mutalib, Hussin. (2003). Parties and Politics: A study of Opposition Parties and the PAP in Singapore. Singapore: Eastern University Press. - ISBN 981-210-211-6 (Paperback)

See also

• PAP

---

Source: Wikipedia | The above article is available under the GNU FDL. | Edit this article