If said Singapore GE2020 does not involve any psychological strategy, tactic or mind game, it is totally impossible. It is not that psychological strategy or tactic is incorrect BUT to those purposely taking advantage of others' psychological weakness is definitely an immoral thing to do.
There are 93 Parliament seats in this election coming from 17 GRCs and 14 SMCs. Of the 17 GRCs, 11 of them are 5-members GRC while the remaining 6 are 4-members GRC. For any political party to form the government of the day, they must secure at least 50% of the seats (at least 47 in this case). Another important figure is the 2/3 majority. For those don't know what so special about the 2/3 majority, please go read up. In this case, to deny 2/3 majority, the ruling party cannot get 62 or more seats, or the opposition must secure at least 32 seats. We put aside those NCMP and NMP as these people do not officially represent the people. The 3 biggest opposition parties in this election are PSP, WP and SDP with 24, 21 and 11 candidates respectively.
Firstly, we ignored the contribution of the rest of the smaller oppositions. PSP contesting in 4 GRCs and 5 SMCs. WP in 4 GRCs and 2 SMCs. SDP in 2 GRCs and 3 SMCs. The combine total of SMCs from these 3 is only 10 meaning at best they can only win maximum 10 out of 14 from the SMCs segment. The combine total of GRCs from these 3 is also 10 out of 17. Of the 10 GRCs, 6 are 5-member and the other 4 are 4-member.
Scenario 1
The 3 opposition parties secure the maximum of 10 SMCs. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 22 from the GRCs. These 22 could be the followings :-
1. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC)
2. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 3 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
4. 2 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations as no other way they could secure 22. No matter which combination, the number of GRCs they must win is 5. To get 32, they must achieve 50% and 100% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
To get 47 so that they could form the next government (coalition government to be exact) as 47 out of 93 is 50.5%, they need 37 from the GRCs. These 37 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they must win is 8 out of 10. To get 47, they must achieve 80% and 100% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
Scenario 2
The 3 opposition parties can only secure a maximum 5 out of 10 SMCs. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 27 from the GRCs. These 27 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
4. 3 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 6. To get 32, they must achieve 60% and 50% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
To get 47 to form the next government (coalition government to be exact) they need 42 from the GRCs. These 42 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The is the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 9. To get 47, they must achieve 90% and 50% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
Scenario 3
The opposition parties fail to win any of the SMC. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 32 from GRCs. These 32 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 7. To get 32, they must achieve 70% success rate for GRC.
To get 47 to form the next government (coalition government to be exact), they need 47 from GRCs. Unfortunately, there isn't allowable combination since after securing all 6 (5-members GRC), they still need 17 from the 4-members GRC. They only have a maximum of 16 from the 4-members GRC.
From the above statistic, we get the following conclusion :-
1. To deny PAP 2/3 majority, regardless the performance of SMC (from winning 0 to all), they must need to win 7 out of the 10 GRCs they contested.
2. To form the next government, they must at least win 1 SMC and all 10 GRCs they contested or at best 10 SMCs and 8 out of 10 GRCs.
3. Winning seats from the SMC has very little impact or rather make very little different to the requirement of GRCs they need to secure.
Mathematically, the above scenarios can happen but in life things happen must include a lot of factors and not just purely mathematical basis. Since the introduction of GRC system in 1988, PAP only lost 1 in GE2011 and GE2015. To think they could lose 7 (to deny 2/3 majority) or 8 (to fail to form the government) in GE2020, seriously speaking do you think that is possible ?
There were talk that the opposition parties could form the coalition government. Pure mathematical analysis it is a yes but putting in all factors and rationally, can boldly said it is a no. So that saying is merely a psychological strategy or tactic to take advantage of the people psychological weakness (fear factor) that PAP could not form the next government.
What if we put in contribution of other smaller opposition parties ? Again mathematically it is possible and this will open up more combinations for it to happen. Now, if PAP couldn't win against all these smaller and weaker opposition parties, do you think they deserve to win against the bigger and stronger opposition parties ?
There are 93 Parliament seats in this election coming from 17 GRCs and 14 SMCs. Of the 17 GRCs, 11 of them are 5-members GRC while the remaining 6 are 4-members GRC. For any political party to form the government of the day, they must secure at least 50% of the seats (at least 47 in this case). Another important figure is the 2/3 majority. For those don't know what so special about the 2/3 majority, please go read up. In this case, to deny 2/3 majority, the ruling party cannot get 62 or more seats, or the opposition must secure at least 32 seats. We put aside those NCMP and NMP as these people do not officially represent the people. The 3 biggest opposition parties in this election are PSP, WP and SDP with 24, 21 and 11 candidates respectively.
Firstly, we ignored the contribution of the rest of the smaller oppositions. PSP contesting in 4 GRCs and 5 SMCs. WP in 4 GRCs and 2 SMCs. SDP in 2 GRCs and 3 SMCs. The combine total of SMCs from these 3 is only 10 meaning at best they can only win maximum 10 out of 14 from the SMCs segment. The combine total of GRCs from these 3 is also 10 out of 17. Of the 10 GRCs, 6 are 5-member and the other 4 are 4-member.
Scenario 1
The 3 opposition parties secure the maximum of 10 SMCs. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 22 from the GRCs. These 22 could be the followings :-
1. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC)
2. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 3 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
4. 2 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations as no other way they could secure 22. No matter which combination, the number of GRCs they must win is 5. To get 32, they must achieve 50% and 100% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
To get 47 so that they could form the next government (coalition government to be exact) as 47 out of 93 is 50.5%, they need 37 from the GRCs. These 37 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they must win is 8 out of 10. To get 47, they must achieve 80% and 100% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
Scenario 2
The 3 opposition parties can only secure a maximum 5 out of 10 SMCs. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 27 from the GRCs. These 27 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
4. 3 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 6. To get 32, they must achieve 60% and 50% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
To get 47 to form the next government (coalition government to be exact) they need 42 from the GRCs. These 42 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The is the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 9. To get 47, they must achieve 90% and 50% success rate for GRC and SMC respectively.
Scenario 3
The opposition parties fail to win any of the SMC. In such case, to get 32 to deny PAP the 2/3 majority, they need 32 from GRCs. These 32 could be the followings :-
1. 6 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 1 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
2. 5 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 2 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
3. 4 out of 6 (5-members GRC) + 3 out of 4 (4-members GRC)
The above are the only allowable combinations. The minimum number of GRCs they need to win is 7. To get 32, they must achieve 70% success rate for GRC.
To get 47 to form the next government (coalition government to be exact), they need 47 from GRCs. Unfortunately, there isn't allowable combination since after securing all 6 (5-members GRC), they still need 17 from the 4-members GRC. They only have a maximum of 16 from the 4-members GRC.
From the above statistic, we get the following conclusion :-
1. To deny PAP 2/3 majority, regardless the performance of SMC (from winning 0 to all), they must need to win 7 out of the 10 GRCs they contested.
2. To form the next government, they must at least win 1 SMC and all 10 GRCs they contested or at best 10 SMCs and 8 out of 10 GRCs.
3. Winning seats from the SMC has very little impact or rather make very little different to the requirement of GRCs they need to secure.
Mathematically, the above scenarios can happen but in life things happen must include a lot of factors and not just purely mathematical basis. Since the introduction of GRC system in 1988, PAP only lost 1 in GE2011 and GE2015. To think they could lose 7 (to deny 2/3 majority) or 8 (to fail to form the government) in GE2020, seriously speaking do you think that is possible ?
There were talk that the opposition parties could form the coalition government. Pure mathematical analysis it is a yes but putting in all factors and rationally, can boldly said it is a no. So that saying is merely a psychological strategy or tactic to take advantage of the people psychological weakness (fear factor) that PAP could not form the next government.
What if we put in contribution of other smaller opposition parties ? Again mathematically it is possible and this will open up more combinations for it to happen. Now, if PAP couldn't win against all these smaller and weaker opposition parties, do you think they deserve to win against the bigger and stronger opposition parties ?
Remark -- Added 7th Jul 2020
The scenario for which PSP, WP and SDP in combine getting 47 or more Parliament seats to deny PAP the majority to form the government is ONLY TRUE when PSP, WP and SDP came into the election as a coalition and not just individual political party. As they entered the election as individual party, the correct term should be just "to deny PAP the majority to form government automatically".
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知错不认真懦夫
主将无能垮三军
左士缺策只砸钱
右士辱人自被辱
左象无计只会泣
右象理人理出祸
左马略识色不分
右马讲据终慢拍
小卒仗权乱闹事
大敌当前夸本领
火烧眉头方才悟
城门紧闭称闭窗
高傲自大多借口
知错不认真懦夫
