Dear Guests,
We hope you’re as excited about THE political event of the year as we are! To make Singapore’s first Town-Hall style Q & A with the leaders of political parties in Singapore a success, here’s some important information for you to take note of before you attend:
Moderation format
Given the number of speakers for the evening, we have designed a format that we hope will ensure the best opportunity for them to explain their party positions, while maximizing your opportunities to ask them questions.
The discussion for the evening will be broken into the following general categories:
1) Economic policy
2) Civil Liberties
3) Political issues
For each section topic discussion, we will be calling for 8 questions from the audience: we will ask for 6 questions to be directed at the individual parties (“party questions”) to further explain their position on the issues, while 2 questions should be directed to all the panelists in general (“general questions”). If a party receives no questions from the audience, the moderator will exercise his discretion to direct a question at the party himself, or carry over the question for the general questions section.
Questions should not exceed 2 minutes in length. We request that participants refrain from making speeches. Answers to questions will be limited to 3 minutes for party questions and 1.5 minutes for general questions.
To maximize the time our audience has to ask questions, the politicians on the panel will not be making opening speeches. 3 minutes will be given to each speaker to make closing statements at the end of the evening.
We request that audience members maintain a respectful attitude to our speakers. Ad hominem attacks unrelated to policy will not be entertained. You can be incisive, but not impolite!
To ensure maximum participation from our audience, our moderator will strictly adhere to all stipulated time limits. Follow-up questions will be disallowed.
Registration
As we have reached capacity for registered guests, we are unfortunately unable to accommodate walk-in participants.
If you did not receive any confirmation emails from us, or have not registered, please do not turn-up at the venue tomorrow. We will not be able to admit you into the room. This applies also to members of the media which did not register with us. We ask for your understanding.
All participants are kindly requested to start registering at the ballroom entrance at 7.00pm and must be seated by 7.45pm.
Dresscode
Smart casual, no slippers or shorts please!
Refreshments
Please come on a full stomach, we apologize for not being able to provide refreshments.
Final tips
To make this event a fruitful one for everyone, here are a few tips on how to use your question for maximum effect:
1) Spend a few minutes before the forum thinking about which discussion section your question belongs under and who you’d like to direct the question to
2) Bring only your best question for the evening: given the number of people attending, you might not get a second go at the mike
3) Get straight to the point, don’t start your question with a speech or you might not have time to ask the question
We’re looking forward to seeing you on Thursday evening!
Best regards,
Choo Zheng Xi
Moderator
