Everything About George Goh Ching Wah’s Eligibility to Run as President Simplified & Summarised for You

By
George Yang
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Here’s the golden question everyone’s asking: is George Goh Ching Wah eligible to run for President?

(Which essentially means: Do we still have a public holiday?)

Technically speaking, George Goh’s eligibility, based solely on public records and history, is rather slim.

But he might still have a chance.

Here’s George Goh Ching Wah’s eligibility chances, simplified for you.

Everything About George Goh Ching Wah’s Eligibility to Run as President Simplified & Summarised for You

The $500 Million Question: The Eligibility Criteria Simplified for a 5-Year-Old

Before anything, here’s what you need to know about the eligibility criteria for candidates coming from the private sector:

  • Being a chief executive (i.e. leader) of a company for at least 3 years
  • During the time when the person is the head, the company must have at least $500 million in shareholders’ equity
  • The company must also have made profit during that period

But here’s the thing: it is also acceptable if the person has “the requisite experience and ability to effectively carry out the functions and duties of the office of President” if the person has served “at least 3 years in an office in a private sector organisation” that kind of fits the criteria.

Basically, show that to a lawyer and he’d probably say, “Oh, that’s all in the language.”

And if you need the lawyer to simplify even further in Singlish, the second part basically says, “Agar agar need to be a good leader in a super big company that earns lots and lots of money, kind of like the first three points mentioned lah.”

Get it so far?

Now, here’s the thing: this eligibility criteria is rather new.

Before 2017, the company needs to have $100 million paid-up capital instead.

Paid-up capital is kind of like the amount of money people invested in the company; however, it doesn’t show whether a company is running well or not. Instead, it shows how big the company is.

For example, honestbee has massive paid-up capital: it has at least USD$49 million in 2018. It’s no doubt big, but we all know what happened after that: it’s now struggling to paid back millions of dollars.

Basically, anyone who’s rich can easily start a company with high paid-up capital; the challenge is keeping the business financially sustainable with its revenue and expenses, which is what shareholders’ equity is all about (kind of).

Simply put, imagine you’re the sole shareholder of Grab. If, on the next day, Grab closes down completely, how much would you get back?

The company would have to minus its assets (money or things they have) from its liabilities (money or things they have to pay back in full). Sometimes, the amount is negative, like in the case of honestbee, mainly due to mismanagement.

The amount you get back is the shareholders’ equity. You can probably tell by now that this is a better way to judge a company’s financial status, and most importantly, its management.

This is probably why, since the 2017 Presidential Election, the eligibility criteria has been changed from $100 million paid-up capital to $500 shareholders’ equity.

And yes, that’s also why many there was a walkover in 2017, because….

The Two Popular Candidates in Presidential Election 2017 Failed the $500 Million Shareholders’ Equity

Back in 2017, people have high hopes for two popular president hopeful, Mohamed Salleh Marican and Farid Khan.

Mr Salleh is the founding chairman and CEO of 2nd Chance Properties, the first company owned by a Malay-Muslim to be listed in Singapore. His company then has about $250 million in shareholders’ equity.

Mr Khan, who’s also former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan’s father, is the chairman of Bourbon Offshore Asia Pacific. Back then, Bourbon Offshore Asia Pacific has about $300 million in shareholders’ equity.

You probably know by now what happened next: both of them didn’t get the Certificate of Eligibility.

Which, of course, brings us to the burning question…

What’s George Goh Ching Wah’s Net Worth & is he Eligible to Run for Presidential Election 2023?

George Goh is a businessman with many businesses, so his net worth is unknown. Just think of him as Donald Trump: people know he’s wealthy, but his exact net worth isn’t revealed.

However, unlike Trump who’s focused on mainly one organisation for his wealth (The Trump Organisation), George Goh run and own many businesses.

Other than reports suggesting that he’s the director of over 50 companies, his website also stated that he has owned over 100 companies in Asia, and also owned seven listed companies across Singapore, UK and Australia with a collective market capitalisation of S$3.15 billion.

Do note that there’s a difference between owning a company and running it: I can own Meta by buying its shares, but I’m not Mark Zuckerberg, who runs the company.

For some reason, media reports have often associated George Goh with Ossia International, one of the companies he co-founded. As that is a public company that’s listed in the SGX, its financial statements are public, and it’s revealed that the shareholders’ equity is reportedly about $50 million—much lower than the required amount to be eligible to run as a president.

However, remember: he’s has owned over 100 companies, and seven of them listed.

So, what does this mean?

One of the companies he led (if he’s leading) could fulfil the eligibility criteria of $500 million shareholders’ equity. But that chance is slim, as given that if there’s any, we would definitely know of since there aren’t many such big companies in Singapore.

There are a few other options, too: what if we add all the shareholders’ equity in all companies he run? That could be over $500 million in combined shareholders’ equity, which is very possible.

Another option is that because of the sheer size of the companies he managed, the Presidential Elections Committee (PEC) could deem that he has “the requisite experience and ability to effectively carry out the functions and duties of the office of President.”

Called the private sector “deliberative track”, it’s totally up the PEC’s discretion.

What Does George Goh Ching Wah Say?

It’s be easy if George Goh has done his maths and provided the numbers for us, since there would be private businesses that only he knew about.

However, when asked about the $500 shareholders’ equity issue, he merely said he believed he qualified, and had put together a team for that. But he didn’t address that issue head on.

So basically, technically speaking, George Goh doesn’t automatically qualify based on the eligibility criteria published in the Constitution—but he might still qualify because it’s almost like driving in Singapore: the speed limit is 90 kmh, but if you merely go up to 95 kmh while overtaking a vehicle and was captured by a Traffic Police officer, it doesn’t mean that you’ll definitely get a speeding ticket.

Same same but different lah.

You might also want to watch this video to the end to know more about the eligibility criteria:

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George Yang
Email: [email protected]