GE2025: Campaigning solo the norm for 'very shy' independent Darryl Lo, but he doesn't mind

During the past few days of campaigning, we've seen the various political parties doing walkabouts and rallies as part of their campaigning in the constituencies they're contesting.

They're typically joined by crowds of volunteers and supporters who actively help to distribute flyers and spread their message.

And then we have independent candidate Darryl Lo, who is contesting Radin Mas SMC and is often seen campaigning solo.

A TikTok video of him doing a walkabout alone, posted on April 29, has gained traction on Reddit. 

In the video, he is seen walking around a hawker centre alone, speaking to patrons, shaking their hands and giving out flyers. 

Some netizens on Reddit praised his actions with one saying: "It takes a lot of guts, time, effort and money to run independently as a one-man army. If only this was all it takes to win an SMC. Still, he has my respect for trying."

In an interview with AsiaOne, the 28-year-old shared that while he does have a small team of friends and volunteers who're helping him, most of them hold full-time jobs. 

"Most of them are working in the day. I don't expect them to take leave just to run this campaign with me because it's a personal campaign," he explained.

Despite campaigning alone most of the time, he shared that it has its advantages. 

"I think there's a benefit to having a small team as well. There's not much going back and forth. I can do things on my own schedule, so I don't have to plan in advance. So it feels a lot easier in that sense," he shared.

'I'm very, very shy'

He acknowledged that a bigger team would be more efficient, so that he can cover more ground, and reach out to more residents. 

However, he also feels that this may come off as "insincere". 

"I don't want to go around with a big group of people that disrupts people having lunch at hawker centres. I feel like it's pretty intimidating," Lo shared. 

He added that by making the experience more personal, it also helps residents warm up to him and share their feelings. 

As it's the first time he's running for elections, his first few walkabouts were understandably nerve-wrecking and he had mentally prepared himself for rejection, of which he did experience his own fair share. 

But this has improved over time, he said.

"The first few days were not as great but I think over time, people see the effort that I am putting in. I think they can tell that I'm very, very shy but I still make an effort to go up to their table, initiate conversations and ask for their votes," he recounted. 

"The response has changed slightly. I think the sentiments now are way better than the first few days. People actually come up to me and ask for photographs, they ask me to do my best, it's very supportive."  

In fact, some members of the public even bought him drinks because they realised he didn't have a water bottle with him, he said.

"I'm very thankful," he said gratefully. 

The past few days have become a routine of sorts for Lo and he described it as "pretty tiring". 

Before his walkabouts, which start around 8am, he gets ready by washing up, having breakfast and practising his Mandarin. 

Lo, who is single, admitted that he also uses this period to calm himself down before a long and tiring day. 

As a Radin Mas resident for over 25 years, he's familiar with the crowd situation at each area and plans his walkabouts based off that. 

He usually begins his campaigning by catching the breakfast crowd at the coffeeshops and hawker centres in Bukit Purmei, Telok Blangah Crescent and Jalan Bukit Merah. 

After that's done, he visits residents living in the nearby HDB flats. 

From around 12pm to late afternoon, he gets lunch, films content related to the general election and has a break before resuming his walkabouts in the evening to catch the residents coming home from work. 

He would usually campaign till around 8pm so that he can engage the dinner crowd. 

On Tuesday (April 29), he also did a live meetup at one of the coffeeshops near Bukit Purmei. Despite it being a last-minute announcement, he was encouraged to see around 60 to 70 attendees, he said. 

Why Lo decided to contest

Lo is one of the two independent candidates standing for election when Singaporeans go to the polls on May 3.

Lo and the other candidate — Jeremy Tan, who is contesting Mountbatten SMC — are first-time candidates and both plan to be full-time MPs if elected.

The other candidates contesting Radin Mas SMC are incumbent People's Action Party MP Melvin Yong, 53, and People's Alliance for Reform's Kumar Appavoo, 56.

There are 25,497 voters in Radin Mas.

Lo graduated from the Singapore Management University in 2022 with a law degree and though he did take the bar exam, he decided to join the tech industry. 

He quit his job to focus on his campaign in January this year.

He told AsiaOne that he has been interested in politics since he was in secondary school. 

One memory that stayed with him all these years was watching the elderly folks near his school waiting for diners at the hawker centre to finish eating so they could eat their leftovers. 

"It was so terrible to see. I imagined that it could have been my grandma," he recounted. 

So, his teacher encouraged him to write a letter to his then-MP, Sam Tan, who directed it to Dr Lily Neo, who was MP for Jalan Besar GRC then.

And the next time he saw these same elderly folks in the neighbourhood, they had food coupons to buy themselves a meal. 

"I realised what I did had some impact on someone," he said. 

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melissateo@asiaone.com

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