History
The Reform Party was created by lawyer and politician Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam. Jeyaretnam was the first opposition candidate to be elected Member of Parliament under the Workers' Party of Singapore banner after a period of about 16 years when not a single opposition candidate in Singapore won a seat.
In 2001, he was successfully sued for libel by Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong and was made to pay total damages of S$565,000 and court costs of S$270,000. After missing a damages payment by one day, he was declared bankrupt, disbarred and barred from participating in elections. He resigned from the Workers' Party of Singapore where he had been secretary-general. He authored the books Make it Right for Singapore and The Hatchet Man of Singapore and was often seen promoting his books outside Centrepoint, a shopping centre on Orchard Road. He was discharged from bankruptcy in 2007.
Jeyaretnam then formed the Reform Party, which was officially registered on 3 July 2008. Jeyaretnam was its first, pro-tem Secretary-General.
On 30 September 2008, he died following a heart attack, with a funeral service attended by over 1,000.
As of 2012, the party was headed by Kenneth Jeyaretnam, who was voted in by the CEC to succeed Ng Teck Siong, Jeyaretnam's immediate successor. In an interview in 2010, Kenneth Jeyaretnam explained that when he took over the Reform Party, it was "quite in a bad state". Ng rejected these claims and claimed that the party was in good shape before he resigned.
The party participated in its first election during the 2011 Singapore General Election but did not win a seat, earning ~35% of the vote in the two constituencies that it contested.
Read more about this topic: Reform Party (Singapore)
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