Less than two months after taking over as premier, Lee shed his suit for a close-fitting white polo shirt and joined more than 1300 members of the ruling People's Action Party and its youth wing for a party at Zouk nightclub.

The Today newspaper reported on Friday that, with upbeat mambo music playing, Lee took to the dance floor with a group of the most prominent young PAP politicians as they celebrated the youth wing's 18th anninversary.

"He was dancing and clapping his hands, he looked very comfortable... everybody was shouting and cheering when he came on to the dance floor," one person who was at Zouk told AFP, without wanting to comment on Lee's dance style.

Lee, 52, told the revellers from the DJ console that the PAP, whose socially conservative laws such as the former banning of chewing gum have earned international ridicule, was not a "square" organisation.

"We have some serious people, but we know how to enjoy ourselves too," the Straits Times quoted him as saying.

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