“Daddy, how was your day?”
“Jie jie bullied me today!”
“We saved some snacks for you, remember to eat them!”
Because of his busy work schedule, Minister of State for Defence Desmond Choo often only gets home after his two daughters are already asleep.
However, they would leave sticky notes at the front door or on the dining table, writing messages of concern for their father, telling him about their day, or reminding him to eat the chocolate panda biscuits or cookie sticks they prepared for him.
Talking about his daughters, aged seven and 10, Choo said with a smile during a joint interview with Lianhe Zaobao and The Straits Times last Friday (August 22),
“The next day, they will check. If I didn’t finish the snacks or reply to their notes, they would be upset.”
Balancing Ministry, NTUC and Grassroots duties
Since the General Election, Choo has been working non-stop.
On May 23, the new Cabinet ministers, Senior Ministers of State and Ministers of State were sworn in. Just one week later, Singapore hosted the annual Asia Security Summit, the Shangri-La Dialogue.
Having previously served in the police force, he was unfamiliar with Ministry of Defence matters. In the first few days of his new appointment, he had to quickly go through a stack of documents more than three inches thick to catch up.
Now, he has to juggle responsibilities at the Ministry of Defence and the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), while also managing grassroots affairs as Member of Parliament (MP) for Tampines Changkat. Sometimes, he only gets three to four hours of sleep a day.
To complete his work as quickly as possible, Choo has developed time-saving habits, such as replying to emails while exercising on a stationary bike or settling lunch with a quick vegetable and fruit smoothie to free up more time for work.
For his family, he makes it a point to reserve fixed times to spend with his daughters.
Choo, 47, is also NTUC’s Deputy Secretary-General. He was first elected as a Member of Parliament in 2015, and in May this year, he was promoted to Minister of State. He previously served as Mayor of the North East District.
On being appointed to the Defence Ministry
Choo shared that he met Prime Minister Lawrence Wong on May 16, when he was told that the Prime Minister intended to promote him as Minister of State and assign him to the Ministry of Defence.
He asked for 24 hours to consider and to discuss the decision with his wife, but did not ask why he was being posted to the Defence Ministry.
“When I am given a task, I will accept it, and then I will do my best to complete it. Just like when the then-Prime Minister, now Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong, sent me to Hougang, I didn’t ask why. Instead, I thought about how I could do the job well.”
He added that back when he was in the police, he had been involved in security operations during the Shangri-La Dialogue, observing from the sidelines. But now, by being directly involved, he could personally experience Singapore’s role as a small country in global defence, and how it provides a platform for dialogue among defence leaders worldwide.
Choo, who has many years of experience in the labour movement, also hopes to combine the strengths of the Ministry of Defence and NTUC to create more job opportunities for retired servicemen.
Helping retired servicemen with labour movement experience
Regular servicemen usually retire between the ages of 50 and 55. While they are disciplined, well-trained and capable of working for many more years, it is not easy for them to find jobs at that age. As such, Choo hopes to combine the strengths of the Ministry of Defence and NTUC to help open up more opportunities.
The Ministry of Defence set up the Career Transition Resource Centre in 2009 to provide career counselling, job referrals and other forms of support.
“The centre has put in a lot of effort in this area. What I want to do is to find ways to open up more opportunities for them. If they know that there is another job to look forward to after retirement, they can serve with peace of mind and give their best.”
He added that he would explore whether NTUC’s approaches and networks could be applied to Defence, such as retraining models and tapping into its wide range of company connections. For example, servicemen working in logistics could in future take on jobs at the new Tuas Port.
Staying committed to residents
Choo had contested Hougang in the 2011 General Election and the by-election the following year under the People’s Action Party, but was unsuccessful in winning the Workers’ Party stronghold.
In 2015, he shifted to Tampines GRC and was successfully elected. He is now the MP for Tampines Changkat.
Choo has also not slackened in his grassroots work. He believes that since residents have chosen him as their representative, he must live up to their expectations. Many issues cannot be solved just by reading reports. An MP must personally visit the constituency. For example, he is currently studying where additional bus stops can be built. Fortunately, he has an excellent team supporting him in managing community affairs.
