Singapore prides itself as a first-world country with a first-world government. However, when it comes to first world government practices, it seems to fare lesser than those perceived to be of third-world.

To show just how out of place Singapore is in comparison with the rest of the world, we list down the governments that provide live-streaming of its sessions to the public.

Below is a list of countries that have made live parliament sessions available to the citizens via television, radio and web-streaming. (Some unlisted countries might have TV stations that broadcast its sessions but unable to verify because their websites are down.)

Website

Youtube

Radio/audio

Facebook

Television

Albania Bhutan (TV) Greece Poland Turkey

Given the fact that so many countries made live parliamentary sessions accessible, what is stopping Singapore from doing so?

In defence of its decision not to stream its parliamentary sessions live, Senior Minister of State for Ministry of Communications and Information, Chee Hong Tat said that there is no need for live streaming because there is low demand by the population and that there are less than 10% of the population who watches the live broadcast of the Budget announcement each year.

Taking an example from the list of countries, South Africa’s population is close to 56 million individuals but its live-stream parliamentary videos on its official Youtube channel are watched less than 2,000 times by viewers but yet it continues to make the service available. So even if we were to just simply look at South Africa, Mr Chee’s defence seems as weak as straw.

While Singapore does have its broadcasting channel, https://www.parliamentwebcast.sg/. The government hides it from the public viewing despite it being paid by taxpayers’ money.

List updated on 21 May 2020