This post is part of CAPE’s GE2025 Voter Education Portal
Your vote is truly secret – and there are many guardrails ensuring ballot secrecy.
Ostwald & Riambau (2023) found that 3-5% of Singaporean voters, believing that ballots were not secret, voted for the PAP out of fear of reprisals rather than individual preferences. These fears included reprisals on access to HDB flats, primary schools, and civil service job opportunities. They estimate that as a result of this vote swing could have affected the results of between 5-12 closely fought seats in GE2020.