SINGAPORE: Singapore Democratic Party chief Chee Soon Juan will be in the United States this week, speaking at the University of Southern California (USC) and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) on April 15 and 16, respectively.
He announced this in a recent video on social media, and added that on Labour Day, there will be an event at Hong Lim Park organized by young Singaporeans from Workers Made Possible and SG Climate Rally, encouraging viewers to attend.
Dr Chee has been going out of the country to talk about his latest book, Unbroken: The Power of Resilience, which was published in September.
In November, he was in the United Kingdom, where he spoke in London and Oxford. And in late March, he spoke on resilience and politics to young people in three events in the Philippines.
For his upcoming talks in California, which are open to the public, Dr Chee said he was excited to meet Singaporeans in the area, both students and those who live and work there.
He said that while the talk is about “building resilience in an age of rapid change and uncertainty,” he also wanted to update Singaporeans on what is happening in the city-state, as well as to hear their perspectives as to where Singapore is headed.
The SDP secretary-general will be at USC on April 15 (Wednesday) from 3:15 to 6:00 pm, in an event hosted by the USC Singapore-Malaysia Student Association. The following day, he’ll be at UCLA from 4:30 to 6:30 pm for a talk co-sponsored by the UCLA Asia Pacific Center and the UCLA Center for Southeast Asian Studies.
He then invited Singaporeans to attend this year’s Labour Day Rally, saying that 2025’s event had been a “smashing success.”
“I’ve never seen so many young Singaporeans participating so enthusiastically, so vociferously, fighting for their rights and their future. It gave me real hope, seeing so many so committed to this nation,” he added.
The SDP chief then sounded a grim note in his video, claiming that the situation in Singapore is not going well due to widening inequality, with a small section of the population getting richer “while the rest of us are told to accept vouchers, to work harder, to struggle quietly,” and mentioning HDB resale flats breaching the S$1 million mark, making them unaffordable especially for younger Singaporeans.
The May 1 rally at Hong Lim Park, he said, is about hope. “Hope that we can build a fairer Singapore, where hard work is rewarded, where housing is truly affordable, where we prosper together. Hope that we can have a better government, one that listens, one that is accountable, that puts people first.” /TISG
Read also: Chee Soon Juan met Tan Wan Piow for the first time in the UK
