Yeo Guat Kwang

Yeo started his career in 1987 as a teacher at Nanyang Junior College,^[1] and in 1991, he became a Head of Department at Anderson Secondary School.^[1] From 1993 to 1996, he was a Specialist Inspector for Chinese at the Ministry of Education.^[1]

In 1997, Yeo joined the labour movement as an Executive Secretary for the Building Construction and Timber Industries Employees Union (BATU).^[1] In 2001, he became the Executive Secretary for the Singapore Industrial and Services Employees Union (SISEU), as well as the Amalgamated Union of Statutory Board Employees (AUSBE).^[1]

In January 2014, Yeo was appointed Assistant Secretary-General (ASG) in the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC),^[3][4] which has close ties with the PAP.

In December 2016, Yeo was promoted to Assistant Director-General in NTUC.^[5][6]

Yeo is also the chairman of the NTUC's Migrant Workers' Centre, which was set up in 2009.^[7] He is also the head of the Centre for Domestic Employees,^[7] and the director for Workplace Safety and Health.^[8]

Yeo was president of the Consumers Association of Singapore (CASE), a consumer advocacy group founded by the NTUC,^[9] until June 2012.^[10]

In the 1997 general election, Yeo made his political debut in Cheng San GRC as part of a five-member PAP team; said team won 54.82% of the vote against the Workers' Party (WP).^[11][12] He subsequently became the MP for the Punggol South division until 2001, when the GRC was abolished.^[11][13]

In the 2001 general election, with Cheng San GRC abolished, Yeo joined a five-member PAP team in Aljunied GRC, which won in a walkover; he became the MP for the Aljunied–Hougang division.^[14] He retained his seat in the 2006 general election after the PAP team for Aljunied GRC won 56.09% of the vote against the WP.^[15][16]

In the 2011 general election, after his Aljunied–Hougang division was shifted to Ang Mo Kio GRC and renamed Ang Mo Kio–Hougang,^[13] Yeo joined a six-member PAP team for said GRC, which won 69.33% of the vote;^[17][18] he continued to represent the Ang Mo Kio–Hougang division until 2015. It was at the same election that the PAP lost Aljunied GRC to the WP.^[19]

In the 2015 general election, Yeo was redeployed to his former Aljunied GRC, leading four political newcomers in a bid to retake it;^[20] however, the WP narrowly retained the GRC with a majority of 1.9%, or 2,612 votes.^[19] As the PAP team had requested a recount, given that the WP's initially calculated majority was under 2%, the result for Aljunied GRC was only declared around 3.10am the morning after Election Day.^[19] It was later revealed that the PAP had won in the divisions of Serangoon and Paya Lebar, which Yeo and Murali Pillai would respectively have represented, by around 300 votes each.^[21]

Yeo retired from politics prior to the 2020 general election.

As of August 2017, Yeo was a board member at the now-defunct Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore.^[22] He also used to be a board member at the Public Utilities Board, Land Transport Authority, and SPRING Singapore.^[23]

Yeo held directorships in Asiagate Holdings and SIIC Environment Holding as of August 2017.^[23]

He had been a director before in other private companies.^[23]

Yeo is of Teochew descent; his ancestral hometown is Chao'an, Chaozhou.^[24]