Young PAP


The Young PAP is the youth-wing of Singapore's governing People's Action Party, and serves as a youth organisation for young adults and students in Singapore who support the PAP and have an interest in politics.
The Chairman of the group is Janil Puthucheary. Past leaders include the incumbent Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, former Minister for Foreign Affairs George Yeo, Minister for Manpower Lim Swee Say, Member of Parliament Teo Ser Luck and Minister in Prime Minister's Office Chan Chun Sing.

Overview

The YP's predecessor, the PAP Youth Committee was established in 1986, under the chairmanship of Lee Hsien Loong, then a Singapore Armed Forces brigadier general. All PAP members under the age of 35 were grouped under the Youth Committee. In 1993, the Youth Committee was renamed the Young PAP. The then-chairman of the Committee, George Yeo, in an effort to attract members, said that people joining the YP could take positions different from central party leadership. The age limit was raised from 35 to 40. Memberships are issued through the PAP branches under each constituency in Singapore. In 2010, then vice-chairman Zaqy Mohamad said the YP attracts over 1200 new members that year, an increase on the 1000 in 2009.

Structure

The Young PAP comes with the following appointments, with the current chairman as Janil Puthucheary:
AppointmentIncumbent
ChairmanJanil Puthucheary
Vice-ChairmanAmrin Amin
Vice-ChairmanTin Pei Ling
Organising SecretaryCynthia Mark
TreasurerChow Kin Fai William

Activities

Volunteers from Young PAP do community work with the affiliated grassroots groups in their constituencies. They also conduct house visits and follow-ups during election campaigns. Young PAP is also in charge of several online websites since 1995 to create an online presence for the party, under the urging of then-Minister for Information and the Arts George Yeo. Young PAP activists have been noted to have organized teams to work both publicly and anonymously to counter criticism of party and government in cyberspace. After popular forum Sintercom was shut down in 2001, the Young PAP offered their own forum for moderated discussions. They have since set up various blogs and social media accounts with multimedia content to engage the masses.

Notable former members