With Halimah Yacob strolling straight into the highest office in the land as the country’s new president, folks have pointed out the similarities Singapore shared in the election process to a certain country that also has its leader unanimously “voted” for by its people.

It’s North Korea, by the way.

Satire site New Nation pushed out a satirical post about how the hermit kingdom’s ruler, Kim Jong-un, congratulated President Halimah Yacob for “achieving a solid decisive win without the need for an election”.

This, of course, refers to the fact that Halimah didn’t even need to be voted into office, as she was the only certified candidate in the presidential election.

“His Supreme Leader is impressed by the Singapore system of president selection make mandatory for uniting the people in chance to choose great leader,” wrote New Nation author Wang Pei, attributing the quote to a fictionalized fax North Korea sent.

“This is an achievement that has not been invented even in the motherland, where elections are time for the people to renew their faith in the Dear Leader.” Cue laugh track.

But satire was about to become reality. Turns out Pyongyang really did send a congratulatory message to Singapore’s new president.

According to KCNA Watch — a site that aggregates output from the Korean Central News Agency — President of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly of North Korea Kim Yong-Nam did so upon President Halimah’s assumption of the office yesterday.

“Expressing expectation that the friendly and cooperative relations between the two countries would grow stronger on the principle of respect for sovereignty and mutual benefits, the message sincerely wished the Singaporean president success in her work for the prosperity of the country”.

Of course, there weren’t any references to how the first female president of Singapore got the role without any challenges. That’d be too on the nose, probably.

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