It's only a matter of time &, logically speaking, also the way forward. Representative parliamentaries are indirect democracies, anyway. Also, unique to SG's situation, there is this problem of crowded Senior Ministers, scarce qualified Law/Finance Ministers, & unenthused political aspirants that must be resolved sometime or other.

Neither is it a radical idea, though the more established states (eg. USA, UK, Canada, Germany) adopt bicameral systems & then nominate appointees to their other assembly (i.e. Senate or Upper House). Asian countries (Japan, Malaysia, Thailand) tend to opt for "mixed" (some elected, some nominated) members, I notice.

They're all generally associated with legislative powers/duties, though. I assume SG will want to designate nominated ministers to the executive branch instead.

The USA also does this; Obama's cabinet need not be elected, & is also separate from the US Senate & Congress. But they're not an appropriate comparison cuz ours is a unicameral system. I can't really think of any other such parallels with a "good" reputation; they tend to be African or Middle East nations with authoritarian baggage. In other words, it's kinda uncharted waters if the goal is to work towards a more progressive society.

Yeh but in the US even though the President has the power to nominate any cabinet minister, his powers are curtailed by the houses which, lest we forget, are directly elected by the people. The US President, in spite of all his powers, will never spend more than 8 years in his post - we've never had a prime minister spend less than 10 years in office except for the incumbent.

And let's not forget the little matter that the US president is directly elected. If you change the constitution so that the chief executive is an elected position, I'm sure Singaporeans are more than willing to accept non-elected officials as cabinet ministers.

It's not just the US. Cabinet ministers may be appointed in the UK and other Commonwealth countries too. It's really not as radical an idea as one might think.

What the issue is about, you're basically taking power away from the people and giving nothing back.

Actually, at present, we may already have unelected Ministers.

According to our law, NMPs and NCMPs may be appointed Ministers. Technically, we are allowed to have nominated Ministers.

The people have the power to select their leader. Their leader will then have to pick his team. And he is accountable to the electorate about his choices. It is really quite straightforward. That is why it is done in other countries.

To be honest, in Singapore we don't pick the PM. We pick a ruling party, and they decide who gets to be PM.

Democracy doesn't mean that the electorate gets to micro-manage everything. That will be a disaster