Ong Ye Kung is a Singaporean politician who has served as the Minister for Transport since 27 July 2020. He also served as the Minister of Education from 1 October 2015 to 26 July 2020. From 1 October 2015 to 30 April 2018, he served alongside Ng Chee Meng. He was in charge of Higher Education and Skills while Ng Chee Meng was in charge of Schools. On 1 May 2018, the position was merged again into a single ministerial portfolio. He has also been the Member of Parliament for Sembawang Central ward in the Sembawang GRC since 11 September 2015.
Career
From 1993 to 1999, Ong served in the Ministry of Communications, during the late Ong Teng Cheong's presidential term. Ong then served in the Ministry of Trade and Industry from 2000 to 2003 as Director of Trade and Deputy Chief Negotiator for the Singapore-US Free Trade Agreement, which was signed in May 2003. From 2002 to 2004, Ong was the Principal Private Secretary to Singapore's then Deputy Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong, who was then Finance Minister and later became PM. Ong was the Chief Executive of the Singapore Workforce Development Agency from 2005 to 2008. Following that, Ong joined the NTUC as Assistant Secretary-General. In 2011, Ong contested as part of the 5-member PAP team led by Minister for Foreign AffairsGeorge Yeo in the Aljunied Group Representation Constituency. His team was defeated by the Workers' Party team led by the party's Secretary-General Low Thia Khiang, marking the first occasion in Singapore's history in which the PAP lost an election in a GRC. Therefore he lost his MP seat in that year. Following the general election, Ong continued to work at the NTUC. He became the NTUC's Deputy Secretary-General in June 2011 and was elected into the NTUC's Central Committee later that year. He then left NTUC to move to the private sector from 2013-2015. In 2015, Ong contested as a PAP candidate in the Sembawang Group Representation Constituency at the 2015 general election. Sembawang GRC was considered a 'safer' ward for his election. His team won, and he became a Member of the Parliament. In 2017, Ong moved a Bill in Parliament to confer Singapore University of Social Sciences autonomous status. Ong is widely seen as one of the three leading contestants to be the fourth generation Prime Minister for Singapore.
Former Board member of the SMRT Corporation As an independent director, Ong was appointed to head an internal investigation into the major train disruptions between 15 and 17 December 2011.
Chairman of the Employment and Employability Institute
Advisers to the NationalTransport Workers' Union, Singapore Industrial and Services Employees’ Union, and Attractions, Resorts & Entertainment Union
Executive Secretary for the National Transport Workers' Union and the Singapore Manual and Mercantile Workers' Union.
A Hokkien Singaporean, Ong is married to Diana Kuik Sin Leng, daughter of real estate magnate Kuik Ah Han. The couple has two daughters. Ong's father, Ong Lian Teng, was a Barisan Sosialis politician who was a Member of the Legislative Assembly for Bukit Panjang constituency from 22 October 1963 to 8 August 1965 and then as Member of Parliament from 9 August 1965 till 5 December 1966, when he resigned to protest the "undemocratic acts" of the PAP government. In an interview with The Straits Times in 2011, Ong noted that his father had been fully supportive of his decision to become involved in politics as a member of the PAP despite his own past involvement in opposition politics in Singapore.
