The new TikTok star? Young SDP member uses social media to spread awareness

Singapore — The youth wing of the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) has launched their new TikTok account, and are using it to spread awareness about current events.

Launched on Friday (Jan 29), the Young Democrats have jumped onto the bandwagon of TikTok, a video-sharing social networking service. They initiated this platform to increase their outreach to the young generations, who are avid TikTok users.

@sgyoungdemocratsPreserve Our Forests! ##sgtiktok ##fyp ##foryoupage ##xyzbca ##sdp ##democrats♬ Way Back Home – Shaun

Their latest video is a plea to “Preserve our forests”, a hot topic after it was announced that Dover forest will be cleared for residential estates. In their short video, they shared footage and facts about the Bukit Batok hillside forest, which is included in plans to be cleared for residential estates.

They spoke about the different species of wildlife which reside in the forest, including the oriental whip snake, white-crested laughing thrushes, and insect species such as dragonflies and butterflies.

Their first video has gone viral, with over 13 thousand views and 700 likes. It featured SDP treasurer Bryan Lim, who made a video regarding Singapore football. He expressed his  support for the local football teams by showing off his multiple football jerseys.

As of Wednesday (Feb 3), the Young Democrats have only posted three videos, but have hit a collective number of 14.2 thousand views, and 779 likes. The young SDP would like to use this platform to provide a light-hearted take on local affairs and politics, as well as create a platform to engage the youths in politics.

With over one million TikTok downloads from Singapore alone, the number of Singaporean users has skyrocketed since 2020. There is no surprise that using TikTok will increase their outreach, especially among the younger generation. TikTok shared in 2019 that 69% of its users are in the age range of 13-26, which happens to be the age range of the youth wing members.

Denise Teh is an intern at The Independent SG. /TISG