Kenneth Jeyaretnam co-opted into Reform Party CEC

Mr Kenneth Jeyaretnam, the elder son of the late opposition leader Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam, joined the opposition Reform Party three weeks ago and has been co-opted into the party’s Central Executive Committee, according to the Straits Times. 

The Reform Party (RP) was set up by the late Mr JB Jeyaretnam a few months before he died last September.

“The 50-year-old hedge fund manager was co-opted into the party's 13-man central executive committee (CEC) a week later,” the Straits Times says.

Mr Jeyaretnam, who graduated from Cambridge with a double-first class honours degree in economics, had been working in London for several years. He returned to Singapore last year when his father took ill.

When contacted by The Online Citizen, the Reform Party’s chairman, Mr Ng Teck Siong, said Mr Jeyaretnam’s membership “will raise some interest among [the] public… that one of the sons of JBJ is joining us.”  Mr Ng also hopes that with Mr Jeyaretnam’s presence in the RP, the legacy of Mr JBJ will carry on. “It will be alive,” Mr Ng said and added that the party’s aim is to carry on the legacy of Mr JBJ to “improve life in Singapore – politically and socially.”

“We have other people joining us,” Mr Ng says.  “We hope more and more will join RP.” Asked about the next general election, he says the party will put up candidates to participate and that the party will work hard to get a good result.

Mr Jeyaretnam is married and has a 12-year old son.

TOC will bring you more at a later time.

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