SINGAPORE: Speculation that former Chief of Defence Force (CDF) Melvyn Ong Su Kiat may be among the ruling party’s slate of candidates at the next election has gotten stronger after the Public Service Decision announced today (28 Apr) that he has been given a permanent secretary role, following his retirement from the army.
The 48-year-old stepped down from his CDF position last month. With his new appointment, he becomes the tenth ex-CDF out of the total ten former CDFs in Singapore’s history to hold key roles in government ministries, statutory boards, and firms that are known to have close ties to the establishment, after they left the Forces.
Mr Ong is set to join the Administrative Service and take on his new role as Permanent Secretary (Defence Development) on 1 Jun – the same date on which he will officially retire from the Singapore Armed Forces.
His new appointment has confirmed speculation that he may find a post for himself within a government-linked entity after his retirement from the military. It has also renewed rumours that politics may be in his future as some of his predecessors jumped into politics after retiring from the military.
The next election must be held no later than 23 November 2025 but analysts have predicted that it will take place earlier, perhaps as early as June next year. Whatsapp and Telegram chat groups are spreading rumours that Mr Ong will figure in the People’s Action Party’s (PAP) slate for the election.
If Mr Ong is unveiled as a PAP candidate, he may be joined by another former CDF, unseated ex-MP Ng Chee Meng.
Mr Ng was fielded as a fresh face in the 2015 general election, which took place less than a month after he retired from the army. He was put in a six-member team under the leadership of the then-Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean and coasted to victory and into Parliament.
He then became one of the rare few in Singapore’s history to be appointed as cabinet minister as soon as he joined Parliament. As part of the PAP’s fourth-generation (4G) cohort of leaders, Mr Ng was made Minister of Education (Schools) and Second Minister for Transport shortly after the election in 2015.
In 2015, he was appointed a Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office and was elected Secretary-General of the Government-linked labour movement, NTUC.
In his second election, Mr Ng was identified as the leader of the PAP team contesting the newly carved out Sengkang GRC. In a stunning upset, Mr Ng and his team lost to the Workers’ Party (WP).
Although he was voted out of the political office and lost his ministerial position, Mr Ng remains active as a PAP branch chairman in Sengkang and has discretion over how taxpayer funds are disbursed in the opposition-held ward.
He was also appointed to continue as labour chief, despite losing the election, in a move that was contrary to the norm – a move that signals that he will contest the next election under the PAP banner.
All eyes on whether Melvyn Ong will join the PAP as ex-CDF steps down