The PAP has dominated the political arena until today. The republic utilises a Westminster system with a unicameral parliamentary government. The president at the Istana is head of state and, while historically a figurehead, in 1991 the Constitution of Singapore was amended to so that this the president would be popularly elected, and also to grant him powers of veto in certain key decisions. Most of the executive powers are held by the Cabinet, ministers led by the Prime Minister of Singapore. The Prime-ministers to date have been: Lee Kuan Yew (1959-1990), Goh Chok Tong (1990-2004), & Lee Hsien Loong (2004-present).
Singapore is a democracy, in that it has a popularly elected president and prime-minister. It has been alleged, however, particularly by foreign political analysts that Singapore is more of an authoritarian state than a true democracy. It has been classed by the Economist Intelligence Unit as a “hybrid” country, with both elements of both authoritarianism and democracy. Opposition parties such as the Workers Party have asserted that Singapore is a de facto one party state. The leaders of the PAP, though, were convinced that for a city-state such as Singapore with no natural resources (apart from its deep water port) partisan politics was a luxury that could not yet be afforded. Whatever the reason, Singapore has proved to be extremely stable, both politically and economically, and has been repeatedly rated by Transparency International as the least corrupt country in Asia and amongst the top ten cleanest from corruption in the world.