Singapore PM's estranged brother joins opposition party as election looms

FILE PHOTO: Lee Hsien Yang, son of former leader Lee Kuan Yew, delivers his eulogy during the funeral service at the University Cultural Centre at the National University of Singapore March 29, 2015. REUTERS/Edgar Su

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The Singapore prime minister's brother, Lee Hsien Yang, said on Wednesday that he had joined an opposition party competing against his sibling at the upcoming July 10 election but that he was undecided on whether he would run as a candidate.

Lee Hsien Yang, the son of Singapore's modern-day founder, Lee Kuan Yew, has been embroiled in a bitter dispute with his brother over his late father's house. He told Reuters he had joined the new Progress Singapore Party (PSP).

Lee has criticised his brother Lee Hsien Loong's People's Action Party (PAP), which their father founded and which has governed the city-state since its independence in 1965.

Last year, Hsien Yang said that the PAP had "lost its way" and that he "supported the principles and values of the Progress Singapore Party."

The PSP is led by Tan Cheng Bock, a former PAP lawmaker who shot to prominence by nearly defeating a candidate backed by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in the 2011 presidential race.

"We will see," Lee Hsien Yang replied when asked whether he would stand as a candidate.

PSP said on Twitter that it welcomed Lee Hsien Yang as a member.

"It's time for change," it added.

(Reporting by Fathin Ungku and John Geddie; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Gerry Doyle)