PM Lee says potential office holders will be thrown into the deep end if elected. (AP file photo)
People's Action Party (PAP) candidates who are potential office holders will be "thrown into the deep end" immediately if elected.
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said that these candidates would not have the luxury he had previously, referring to the 20 years he had in politics before assuming the role as Prime Minister.
"We will throw them into the deep end. That is the first step. Then we will see how they work out. There is no other way," he said told The Straits Times on Thursday.
The former Brigadier General entered politics in 1984 when he was 32. He stood for election at Teck Ghee, where he won 80.38 percent of the votes against a candidate from the now inactive United People's Front.
He was first appointed as Minister of State for both the Ministry of Trade and Industry and Ministry of Defence. In 1987, he became the Minister for Trade and Industry.
PM Lee highlighted the importance of finding successors as his cabinet is an aging one.
"I am 59 years old, and my colleagues are all in their 50s."
The youngest ministers today are Lui Tuck Yew and Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, who both turned 50 recently.
PM Lee told the same paper that of the 24 new candidates, more than half can be "more than backbenchers", and "at least five" can become ministers.
He did not identify the five, but it is speculated that they could be a handful of civil servants -- Major-General (NS) Chan Chun Sing, Brigadier-General (NS) Tan Chuan-Jin, labour movement assistant secretary-general Ong Ye Kung, former Monetary Authority of Singapore managing director Heng Swee Keat and former Energy Market Authority head Lawrence Wong.
Heng is the oldest at 50 and Wong the youngest at 38.
The Prime Minister admitted that he did not manage to bring in as many potential "office-holder types" as he would have liked in 2006, and revealed a more aggressive push in the renewal of leadership this year.
Only three from the 2006 batch were seen as potential ministers -- Lui, Grace Fu and Lee Yi Shyan -- who were all made Ministers of State after being elected.
"This time, I think I have an exceptionally rich crop and we will have to make up for lost time," said PM Lee, referring to the 2011 batch of candidates.