Do we like them?

Do we like Halimah Yacob?

Our score: 8 out of 10. A career spent on workers, single mothers and the disadvantaged, with no harmful words found, held back only by the contested way she got the top job.

Halimah Yacob started out as a legal officer at Singapore's National Trades Union Congress in 1978 and rose to deputy secretary-general. She entered Parliament in 2001 and was made a minister of state in 2011. In 2013 she became the first woman Speaker of Parliament.

In 2017 she became Singapore's eighth president, and the first woman in the job. It was a reserved election for Malay candidates, and two rivals were ruled ineligible, so she was named without a vote. That drew public criticism, including from opposition figure Tan Cheng Bock, who said people felt muzzled and angry. Her own line was that she was a president for everyone.

On the harm test, there is nothing nasty on the record. As president she gave assent to the bill repealing Section 377A, the law that criminalised gay sex, on 27 December 2022. That was a constitutional step for her office, not a campaign. The same package protected the current definition of marriage from legal challenge, so LGBTQ+ readers will see it as half a win. Nothing here shows her pushing against anyone's rights.

She is also a vocal voice on Palestinian suffering. In February 2025 she called Donald Trump's Gaza remarks “truly horrifying”. A Facebook page then attacked her comments, and the acting Muslim affairs minister publicly defended her in May 2025. Where you land on the politics of that depends on your view of the conflict, but her words were about humanity and civilians.

Nothing in the sources we could open shows her being sued, convicted or accused of mistreating anyone. The abuse went the other way: a man who called for her death online while she was president was jailed in 2025 after pleading guilty to harassment charges. That is on him, not on her.

The good stuff is long and real. The Order of Temasek citation credits her with championing single mothers, lower-income children, people with disabilities and the elderly. During COVID-19 she approved a draw of up to $69 billion from past reserves. She received Singapore's highest civilian honour in October 2023.