Finance Minister Lawrence Wong unveils major tax measures to fund spending needs
Singapore to raise GST from 7% to 9% in two stages in 2023 and 2024
Assurance Package increased to $6.6 billion; GST Voucher scheme beefed up to offset GST hike
Higher personal income taxes for top 1.2% of taxpayers in Singapore
Higher taxes on residential properties, luxury cars, as Singapore adjusts wealth taxes
By Justin Ong, Political Correspondent, The Straits Times, 18 Feb 2022
Singapore on Friday (Feb 18) unveiled a slew of progressive tax measures aimed not only at generating revenues to fund major programmes needed over the next few years, but also at addressing social inequalities.
The hike in goods and services tax (GST) to fund the recurring social and healthcare needs of a rapidly ageing population was further delayed to 2023 in response to concerns over rising prices.
The hike will be staggered over two steps - with GST rising from 7 per cent to 8 per cent on Jan 1 next year, and then to 9 per cent from Jan 1, 2024. The impact of the increase will be cushioned, especially for low-income households.
The wealthy will also pay more of other taxes.
"Those who earn more, contribute more," said Finance Minister Lawrence Wong in his first Budget since assuming the portfolio in May last year, as he outlined increases in personal income, property, vehicle and carbon taxes as part of an expansionary $109 billion Budget, including special transfers.
He also announced a $6 billion draw on the reserves as part of Singapore's continuing fight against Covid-19, and over $1 billion in support for businesses, households and individuals hard-hit by the pandemic.
With a view to future challenges and opportunities, Mr Wong said he would commit up to another $1 billion or so to spur companies to invest in new capabilities, while further tightening workforce policies to ensure foreign hires of the "right calibre".
This year's Budget will run up an expected overall deficit of $3 billion, amid a tone of cautious optimism sounded by Mr Wong as Singapore enters a period of transition and recovery after two years of grappling with the pandemic and its fallout.
"The global economy is still vulnerable to pandemic-related risks, and further supply chain disruptions. Geopolitical and security risks loom," he warned at the start of his speech, which was around two hours long. "We may also see a slowdown in external demand as the major economies scale back their pandemic support, and central banks tighten their accommodative monetary policies to deal with the threat of inflation."
But barring fresh disruptions, Mr Wong said he expects the Singapore economy to continue to do well, and grow by 3 per cent to 5 per cent this year.
"That means everyone chips in and contributes to a vibrant economy and strengthened social compact, but those with greater means contribute a larger share," said Mr Wong, who also co-chairs a multi-ministry task force handling the pandemic.
To that end, personal income tax will be increased from 2024. The portion of chargeable income in excess of $500,000 up to $1 million, will be taxed at 23 per cent, up from 22 per cent currently. Chargeable income in excess of $1 million will be taxed at 24 per cent.
Property tax rates will also be increased, with more significant hikes for high-end properties, said Mr Wong.
For non-owner-occupied residential properties, including investment properties, tax rates will go up from the current 10 per cent to 20 per cent range, to 12 per cent to 36 per cent.
For owner-occupied ones, tax rates for the portion of annual value in excess of $30,000 will be increased from the present 4 per cent to 16 per cent, to 6 per cent to 32 per cent.
Luxury cars will be taxed at a higher rate, with an additional Additional Registration Fee tier for cars at a rate of 220 per cent for the portion of Open Market Value in excess of $80,000.
Meanwhile, the projected $6 billion draw on the reserves "to maintain a multi-layered public health defence" against Covid-19 has received in-principle support from President Halimah Yacob.
This will be the third year in a row that the reserves are being tapped, bringing the total expected drawdown for the three financial years of 2020 to 2022 to $42.9 billion - less than the initial sum of $52 billion the Government earmarked in 2020.
This reflects Singapore's prudence in the use of past reserves, he said, explaining that Singapore's pandemic response had averted worse public health outcomes, and that the rebound in economy and businesses had been stronger than expected.
Still, in recognition that some segments of society continue to struggle, Mr Wong announced a $500 million Jobs and Business Support Package, which includes a Small Business Recovery Grant for those most affected by Covid-19 restrictions, such as food and beverage and hospitality enterprises.
They will receive a $1,000 payout per local employee, up to a cap of $10,000 per firm.
A $560 million Household Support Package will also help Singaporeans with utility bills, education and daily essentials. It includes GST Voucher-U-Save rebates for the rest of the year, and additional $100 in Community Development Council Vouchers for all.
To plan ahead for a post-pandemic world and the opportunities it offers, Singapore will also commit an additional $200 million over the next few years to schemes to build digital capabilities in business and workers; and around $600 million to expand the Productivity Solutions Grant for SMEs to implement automation efforts.
New initiatives such as the Singapore Global Enterprises and Singapore Global Executive Programme will help larger firms grow overseas and attract the next generation of leaders.
At the same time, to ensure that incoming employment pass holders are comparable in quality to the top third of the local professionals, managers, executives and technicians (PMET) workforce, from September this year their qualifying salary threshold will be raised from $4,500 to $5,000; and from $5,000 to $5,500 for the financial service sector.
Environmental sustainability was also on the Budget agenda, with Mr Wong revealing that Singapore will now target net zero emissions by or around 2050.
Its previous aim was to halve emissions by then, with a view to achieving net-zero "as soon as viable in the second half of the century".
To match these new ambitions, taxes on carbon emissions will be raised from the current $5 per tonne to $25 in 2024 and 2025, and $45 in 2026 and 2027, with a view to reaching $50 to $80 by 2030.
Another key plank of this year's Budget was renewing and strengthening Singapore's social compact.
For lower-wage workers, a new Progressive Wage Credit Scheme will see the Government helping businesses by co-funding wage increases between 2022 and 2026, for employees earning up to $2,500. For those earning above $2,500 and up to $3,000, co-funding support will be offered until 2024.
From Jan 1, 2023, the qualifying income cap for the Workfare Income Supplement will be raised from $2,300 to $2,500.
Mr Wong also sketched out other efforts in boosting retirement adequacy, investing in children, integrating social service delivery, preparing for future healthcare needs, and better supporting the charities sector; with more details to come when MPs debate the Budget and spending plans of various ministries in the coming weeks.
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in a Facebook post that this Budget will lay the basis for “sound and sustainable government finances, post-pandemic and beyond”.
“We are building a greener and more sustainable city, transforming our economy to create good jobs for Singaporeans, expanding our healthcare system for an ageing society, and strengthening social programmes so that no one is left behind,” he added.
"Looking back at what we have been through during these Covid-19 years, we have nothing to fear. We will always overcome. We will always prevail," he concluded.
"We will chart a new way forward together. We will see through the pandemic today, and build a better Singapore tomorrow."
IPS-Nathan Lecture: The Singapore Media's Long and Winding Road: 1824 to 2022
By Goh Yan Han, Political Correspondent, The Straits Times, 17 Feb 2022
The commonly cited Reporters Without Borders (RSF) index reflects its assessment of media laws in a country, rather than the quality of the journalism there, said Mr Patrick Daniel on Thursday (Feb 17).
He noted how RSF's annual World Press Freedom Index ranked Singapore 160th in its 2021 edition, and questioned if Singapore deserved its ranking, which was one spot above Somalia, one below Sudan, and well below Russia and Myanmar.
He pointed out that the index is a measure of "the level of freedom available to the media". It is not an indicator of the quality of journalism in the country.
"Many of our critics don't make that distinction."
RSF's view is that Singapore's media laws breach media freedom, Mr Daniel added.
He was asked if the Singapore media should engage with the people behind the index.
Mr Daniel said that in his many years as editor-in-chief of Singapore Press Holdings' English/Malay/Tamil Division, not once had those behind the index tried to engage him.
If anyone had asked to see him to discuss press freedom, he would have been happy to do so. "But there is a little bit of opacity in the methodology," he said. "I don't want to rubbish them, they've been doing it for a long time, but there should be some kind of audit of their methodology."
Of POFMA, he said in his lecture: "We will run afoul of people who are absolutist and say you can't have a POFMA. If you looked at what POFMA is, it just says you cannot communicate false facts, it's simple, that's it.
"So for everybody else who is doing a good job, talking truthfully, POFMA doesn't affect us."
Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh had told two party cadres that he met former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan on Oct 3, 2021, and told her he would not judge her, regardless of whether she decided to continue her lie or tell the truth to Parliament.
This was the testimony of former WP cadre Yudhishthra Nathan, who took the stand as the third witness on day five of Singh’s trial on Oct 18.
“He said verbatim ‘I will not judge you’,” said Mr Nathan, who was recounting to the court what transpired during a meeting that he and fellow cadre Loh Pei Ying had with Singh on Oct 12, 2021.
Singh is fighting two charges over allegedly lying to a parliamentary committee that he had, on Aug 8 and Oct 3, 2021, wanted Ms Khan to clarify her untruth in Parliament.
Ms Khan lied to Parliament on Aug 3, 2021, that she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively.
She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
The court heard that when Singh met Mr Nathan and Ms Loh on the night of Oct 12, 2021, the Leader of the Opposition “did convey” that he had a feeling Ms Khan’s untruth would come up when Parliament sat on Oct 4.
So he paid a visit to her house the day before, on Oct 3, 2021.
That was where Singh “conveyed to Ms Khan that whether she decided to continue the lie or narrative, or whether she decided to tell the truth, that he would not judge her”, Mr Nathan told the court.
When Deputy Public Prosecutor Sivakumar Ramasamy asked about his reaction to what Singh said, Mr Nathan replied: “I did think that was rather indecisive of him. But I didn’t verbally express it. I didn’t see a need to at that point in time.”
Asked if Singh had specified when Ms Khan was supposed to decide between continuing the lie and telling the truth, Mr Nathan, who left WP in 2022, said the party chief had not.
Queried on his understanding of Singh’s remark that he would not judge Ms Khan, Mr Nathan said: “He was leaving it open to her that whichever option she chose, including the option to maintain the lie, that he would have no problem with that.”
Mr Nathan said he also asked Singh on Oct 12 if he had consulted former party chief Low Thia Khiang on the matter.
Singh replied that Mr Low’s view was that Ms Khan should come clean as soon as possible, he added.
Mr Nathan, who had been part of WP’s media team, told the court that he had met Ms Khan at least two or three times after Oct 12, 2021, over the personal statement that she was to deliver in Parliament to clarify her lie. It took about half a month to finalise the statement, he said.
Asked by the prosecution if the preparation could be done in one day, he said no.
The court earlier heard his take on Ms Khan’s Aug 8, 2021, text message to their group chat with Ms Loh, in which the former MP had said: “I told them what I told you guys and they agreed that the best thing to do is to take the info to the grave.”
Ms Khan had met Singh, WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap earlier that day.
Mr Nathan said he understood Ms Khan’s message to mean that the three party leaders were telling her to bury the truth about her anecdote and the fact that she had lied in Parliament.
His view of what Ms Khan said was that “as far as party leaders were concerned, this issue of her having lied in Parliament was essentially something the party didn’t need to address”.
He also testified that he wanted to present himself before the party’s disciplinary panel as it had become apparent to Ms Loh and him as early as Nov 13, 2021, that the exercise of having the panel was “more of a witch hunt”.
The court heard that on that day, Ms Khan had told Mr Nathan and Ms Loh via text that she thought Singh wanted her to resign from the party.
In response, Mr Nathan texted: “And he gets off scot-free? Cause right now people don’t know that he knew it was a lie when you told that to (Law and Home Affairs Minister K.) Shanmugam?”
In another text, he said Ms Khan could damage Singh’s reputation if she was asked by the Committee of Privileges (COP) what the party leaders knew, to which Ms Khan replied: “I wouldn’t do that.”
Asked what he understood by Ms Khan’s last message, he said he thought she was fearful of the prospect of telling the COP that the leaders were involved in her maintaining the lie from August onwards.
His sense was her fear had to do with the fact that she was a new MP, though he qualified that “I don’t think she was the only new MP who was a tad bit fearful of what the leaders thought of them”.
Mr Nathan also testified that when he and Ms Loh met the panel on Nov 25, 2021, they made known their reservations about the panel telling Ms Khan that she needed to get the support of her fellow MPs, because at least one of them was “pretty biased against her”.
This bias pretty much started since their interactions at the 2020 General Election, where Ms Khan ran as a first-time candidate, and carried on into their work as fellow MPs, he said.
Mr Nathan then said that having witnessed their interactions during the 2020 General Election, he knew Ms He Ting Ru was “never a fan” of Ms Khan and Associate Professor Jamus Lim.
“I’d say their work relationships also had ups and downs, and as time progressed, it became clear to me that (Ms He) continued to dislike Ms Khan – not saying the same for Jamus but certainly Ms Khan,” he added.
Nathan redacted a message he deemed ‘immaterial’
The prosecution also asked Mr Nathan why he chose to redact a message sent in the group chat with Ms Khan and Ms Loh on Oct 12, 2021, when submitting evidence to the COP.
He said he felt the message, which said “I think we should just not give too many details”, could be redacted as it was “immaterial to the COP investigation”.
Mr Nathan said he sent the message after Ms Khan told the second untruth on Oct 4, 2021, adding that by the end of Oct 12, Singh and the three of them in the group chat were “all on the same page that she should come clean”.
He added that although the COP had asked for content and messages up to November that year, his view was that the committee was interested in how the party leaders treated Ms Khan, kicked her out of the party, and Ms Khan’s state of mind while that was happening.
“I believe they were interested in that precisely because party leaders had been involved since August before she had spoken the second untruth. To me, this message that I’d sent on Oct 12 was immaterial to the COP investigation,” he said.
He added that he was told by “a couple of committee members” that it would be all right to redact irrelevant information and things of that nature in the submissions.
As for how the redaction was done, Mr Nathan said that after he gave his testimony to the COP, he was at some point asked to head down to the Parliament House library, where he sat next to COP member Rahayu Mahzam, who is from the ruling People’s Action Party, to do so in front of a computer screen.
He said they went through the messages that had been extracted from his phone one by one.
While going through the messages, they would talk about what could be redacted and what should stay, he said.
“I believe I was doing the redactions on the spot and I believe I had to provide a reason for why each message had to be redacted,” he added.
Mr Nathan recalled the Deputy Clerk of Parliament and one other Parliament staff member being present as well.
He said Ms Rahayu had to leave for constituency work at some point in the evening, while he stayed on till Parliament staff had to close the library.
They asked him to complete the rest of the redactions and send those by e-mail, he said, adding that he proceeded to do so in his car at the building’s carpark.
Asked if he was told to indicate a reason for redacting his message about not giving too many details, he said he must have indicated that it was not relevant to the COP’s investigations.
Asked if this particular message was approved by anyone, he said he could not remember. He added that there were hundreds of messages and he could not remember at which message Ms Rahayu had stopped being with him.
Mr Nathan’s cross-examination will begin on Oct 21.
Ex-WP cadre describes Raeesah Khan as ‘lao hong’: Key points from Day 5 of Pritam Singh’s trial
The defence concluded its cross-examination of former Workers’ Party (WP) cadre Loh Pei Ying on Oct 18, the fifth day of the trial of WP chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh, and started hearing the prosecution lead evidence from another cadre, Mr Yudhishthra Nathan.
Singh is fighting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to investigate Ms Raeesah Khan’s untruth in Parliament.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
Here are five key points that came up when Ms Loh and Mr Nathan, who both assisted Ms Khan with her duties as MP, testified:
1. Loh had ‘90%’ intention for Khan to tell the truth
When testifying before the COP in 2021, Ms Loh had said there was on Oct 12, 2021, a consensus among Singh, Mr Nathan and her to tell the truth.
Referring to text messages admitted to court for the trial, Singh’s lawyer Andre Jumabhoy sought to show that Ms Loh and Mr Nathan had wanted Ms Khan to continue lying.
One of the messages read to the court showed that on Oct 7, 2021 – when police sent an e-mail requesting to interview Ms Khan – Ms Loh had suggested that the ground they should probably take was to say Ms Khan was not in contact with the victim and hence could not reveal the information for confidentiality reasons.
“You might want to gather some cases of people who shared their stories with you and present that instead,” she also said in the text message.
The court also heard Mr Nathan’s position was that revealing the truth to Parliament and Singapore would be “extremely damaging”, thus he suggested that Ms Khan continue to lie by misdirecting the police query.
Upon questioning by Mr Jumabhoy, Ms Loh disagreed that the messages were a “clear” indication that she and Mr Nathan had intended for Ms Khan to continue lying.
When pressed, she said that before they had gone to see Singh on Oct 12, 2021, she was “90 per cent” intent on Ms Khan telling the truth.
“I had my reservations also because of the degree of consequences I knew the party would face. I wouldn’t say it was 100 per cent, but I was very close to it,” she added.
Mr Jumabhoy had asked her to ascribe a percentage to her intention.
He then asked if Singh had rejected Mr Nathan’s suggestion at the Oct 12 meeting by saying “Don’t even suggest covering this up with another lie”, which she confirmed.
He then argued that, at least when the meeting started, the only one who thought the truth should come out was Singh.
Ms Loh disagreed and said: “No. I thought it too.”
2. Loh thought Khan was naive, self-centred and ‘lao hong’
Ms Loh was later cross-examined on the points she presented on Nov 25, 2021, before the WP disciplinary panel (DP) convened to look into Ms Khan’s lying controversy.
Mr Jumabhoy then asked if she had told the DP that Ms Khan was “naive and stupid”, to which Ms Loh said she could not remember if she used those two terms, but she definitely said “naive”.
The panel comprised Singh, WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap, and Mr Jumabhoy was referring to Ms Lim’s notes for this meeting when questioning Ms Loh on this.
Pressed on the matter, Ms Loh said the points might have come up in the discussion, but since the words “naive” and “stupid” had come up in Ms Lim’s notes, she could have been describing Mr Nathan and her as “naive and stupid” as well.
Mr Jumabhoy then asked if she had also described Ms Khan as “self-centred” and “lao hong”, a Hokkien phrase. Did the dialect phrase mean that Ms Khan was weak and would crumble with criticism, he asked.
Ms Loh agreed that Ms Khan was sometimes self-centred, but said she would not use the word “weak” to refer to her. As for “lao hong”, she said she used the term because she felt Ms Khan was quite susceptible to criticism.
Asked what she understood by “lao hong” if it is not weak, she replied: “Would you call a lao hong biscuit a weak biscuit? That’s how lao hong is usually used. It’s just not a crispy biscuit.”
Mr Jumabhoy said he was told that in reference to biscuits, “lao hong” means that they are stale. “You are saying Ms Khan is stale,” he added.
Ms Loh disagreed with “stale” and said in Singapore, “lao hong” sometimes means “soft”.
By extension, it refers to someone who buckles “quite easily under pressure”.
“She’s susceptible to criticism. What people say online about her affects her mental health quite strongly. That’s what I meant,” she added.
Mr Jumabhoy said these opinions do not show a vote of confidence for Ms Khan, yet Ms Loh did not think Ms Khan should be expelled from the party.
Ms Loh said she was entitled to give her “honest, unfiltered candid opinion” at the DP, and that she had wanted Ms Khan to remain in the party so that WP could better control her narrative.
Otherwise, “there’s very little control the party will have over the narrative that will be put forth to the COP”, she said.
Mr Jumabhoy followed up by asking if Ms Loh was concerned that Singh would accuse Mr Nathan and her of conspiring with Ms Khan in creating the lie.
She said she was “extremely concerned” about that.
“To be more specific, I was extremely concerned on Nov 29, after Ms Khan phoned me in the afternoon and the party leaders strongly recommended that she resign,” she added.
The court also heard that after WP put out a statement announcing Ms Khan’s resignation on Nov 30, 2021, Ms Loh texted Mr Nathan a day later, saying: “I can’t believe our worst nightmare happened.”
Presenting Ms Loh with this message, Mr Jumabhoy asked if her worst nightmare was effectively that Ms Khan could say whatever she wanted to now.
He also asked if her concern was about what Ms Khan would say about Mr Nathan and her.
Ms Loh disagreed with both statements.
3. Loh deleted many messages after giving evidence to COP
Ms Loh had deleted many text messages after giving evidence before the COP, the court heard.
Mr Jumabhoy was asking her about her text correspondence with Mr Nathan on Dec 2, 2021 – the day she presented her evidence before the COP.
This prompted Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock to interject and ask why so much time was being spent on what happened between Ms Loh and Mr Nathan.
This case is not about whether the duo had given false evidence before the COP, Mr Ang said. He said the question at hand is the nature of certain conversations between Singh and Ms Khan specifically on Aug 8 and Oct 3 in 2021.
Mr Jumabhoy replied that the line of questioning was relevant as the witnesses appeared to have aligned their evidence.
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan subsequently allowed the questions while urging Mr Jumabhoy to be clear about his questions.
The court then heard that Ms Loh had deleted messages on her phone after she finished giving her evidence before the COP.
“I deleted many things, including large groups with other volunteers,” she said.
The court also heard that she obtained permission from then Speaker of Parliament and COP chairman Tan Chuan-Jin to call Mr Nathan in between the Dec 2, 2021, hearing to give him a heads-up on the need for him to testify as well.
But the defence put it to her that, during the phone call, she had gone further than that, despite being informed that what she told the COP should not be discussed.
She agreed, recalling to have told Mr Nathan: “I said I can’t believe Pritam said those things to the press. You have to come here and tell the press.”
She said that she was “very emotional” and angry at that point, as COP member Don Wee, from the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP), had given her a wrong piece of information that made her think that Singh had lied.
The information was an article that erroneously stated that Singh knew of Ms Khan’s lie a week after Oct 3, 2021.
“I was concerned that (Singh), quite an influential man, had blatantly lied,” she added.
She said she knew Mr Nathan would be very terrified to be called to testify to the COP, “so I wanted to encourage him to come in and tell the truth, because it was scary, and I wanted to affirm to him that it was a need to be done”.
Another of the messages read in court was one that she sent to a chat group with Ms Khan and Mr Mike Lim, who served as Ms Khan’s legislative assistant from November 2020 to Dec 26, 2021.
In it, Ms Loh had said: “Please don’t tell them we met before COP. This one really, really cannot say.”
The court earlier heard that she, Ms Khan, Mr Nathan and Mr Lim had met on Dec 1 that year, just before they were supposed to give evidence.
Asked at this point if Ms Loh had wanted Ms Khan’s version to align with the testimony she was about to give, she said no.
She also disagreed that in her communications with Mr Nathan on Dec 2 that year, she had told him to tell her version of the truth.
4. Singh ‘afraid’ of Shanmugam, didn’t wish ‘bad karma’ on party: Nathan
One area of discussion during the Oct 12, 2021, meeting between Singh, Ms Loh and Mr Nathan was about the change in the party’s strategy, specifically what made them now want Ms Khan to come clean.
Mr Nathan, currently a PhD student at a local university, said Singh told him he was worried that the Government might already have evidence or would somehow know Ms Khan had lied in Parliament and that the anecdote was untrue.
“My sense at the time was that he was very afraid of (Law and Home Affairs) Minister K. Shanmugam and the Government,” he told the court.
Mr Nathan also remembered Singh saying that if the party were to keep the lie, it would get “bad karma” for it, he added.
Mr Nathan said he asked Singh then if he would be prepared media-wise – to field questions from journalists who would certainly ask whether he stood by Ms Khan and what she did in Parliament – and the WP chief had “kind of waved his hand” and called it a “simple matter”.
He also recalled informing Singh that this time round, it would not just be supporters of the PAP or those in the middle ground who would criticise the party, but also WP’s own members, volunteers and supporters, who had no idea that the leaders knew about Ms Khan’s lie.
At one point, he also asked Singh if he had consulted former WP chief Low Thia Khiang on his view of the matter.
Mr Nathan said he had asked as Mr Low was someone whose judgment he trusted very much, and someone he knew as being “very principled” and seasoned as a politician.
Singh responded that he had consulted Mr Low, and it was the elder’s view that Ms Khan should come clean as soon as possible, and that Ms Khan “still had time before the next GE” to shore up confidence from the ground.
5. Nathan thought WP’s reputation would take an ‘unrecoverable hit’
Between Oct 4 and Oct 12, 2021, Mr Nathan was still vacillating between whether Ms Khan should maintain her lie and stick to the “party position”, or whether she should come clean in some way, he told the court.
At that time, he had thought that the party position was that Ms Khan should maintain her lie as she had sent him a text message conveying the WP leaders’ wish for them to take the information “to the grave”.
Given that Mr Shanmugam had just raised questions around the anecdote at the Oct 4 Parliament sitting, Mr Nathan said he was afraid of what coming clean would mean for WP’s reputation and what others might think of them as loyal members of the party.
Asked to elaborate on his fear, he said he was afraid the reputation of WP “would take an unrecoverable hit” if Ms Khan were to come clean.
Later recounting the events on Oct 12, 2021, Mr Nathan said he was in school when he got into a phone call with Ms Khan late in the afternoon, where she told him that Singh and Ms Lim wanted her to come clean.
In that call, Ms Khan also mentioned that the party leaders were not sure if she should mention the context that she was a sexual assault victim when she came clean, he noted.
Mr Nathan told the court he remembered his response to her was that it “sounds like political suicide” to have an MP go to Parliament and say, ‘Hey everyone, I lied’, and not even explain how she ended up lying in the first place.
He also was made to recount the meeting he had with Ms Loh and Singh on Aug 10, 2021, where they reportedly discussed Ms Khan’s Aug 3 lie to Parliament, as well as her experience with sexual assault.
Asked how he knew they were discussing the lie, Mr Nathan said: “I do remember (Singh) saying something to the effect of conservative religious men in our society would not like to have an MP that was sexually assaulted.
“He said it in passing, but he said it nonetheless.”
Former Workers’ Party (WP) cadre Loh Pei Ying had indicated in a document submitted to the Committee of Privileges (COP) that she redacted a text message because it contained a comment about an MP unrelated to the impending hearings.
But testifying on day four of WP chief Pritam Singh’s trial on Oct 17, Ms Loh admitted lying about the real reason for redacting the message, which was that it “does not look good” on fellow WP cadre Yudhishthra Nathan.
The redacted message, which Mr Nathan sent on Oct 12, 2021, had suggested that they should continue the lie that former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan told in Parliament.
Singh’s lawyer Andre Jumabhoy read the message to the court. It said: “In the first place, I think we should just not give too many details. At most apologise for not having the facts about her age accurate.”
Ms Loh, who was Ms Khan’s secretarial assistant, gave evidence as the prosecution’s second witness in the trial where Singh is fighting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to investigate Ms Khan’s untruth in Parliament.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
Ms Loh’s admission came on the afternoon of Oct 17, when she said she hid Mr Nathan’s comments.
Mr Jumabhoy sought to pin down the reason for Ms Loh’s lie, putting it to her that she had blacked out the message to preserve their credibility, knowing that it would cast a “bad impression” of Mr Nathan. By extension, it also “does not look great on your group”, Mr Jumabhoy posited.
To these suggestions, Ms Loh said: “I wasn’t trying to preserve the integrity, but I was worried that these documents would become public and I didn’t want him to be attacked for it.”
At this point, she mentioned that the redaction process was verified by a senior parliamentary staff member and COP member Rahayu Mahzam from the ruling People’s Action Party.
This set off a back-and-forth over how the redaction was done. Ms Loh said she would ask if she could redact something, and they would agree before doing so. She later also said that they had sat with her to identify the messages that would be needed for the COP.
She later said Mr Nathan had felt guilty to have suggested not giving too many details. He raised this suggestion when the two cadres met Singh on Oct 12, 2021, and the WP chief said it was not a good one, she noted.
Ms Loh said that when she was submitting evidence to the COP, she assessed that the message was not material to investigations and chose not to let it “come to light”, given how guilty Mr Nathan had felt about it.
“That would make him appear poorly because he did eventually change his mind, and it didn’t materialise. This wasn’t something that was acted on. And during police investigations, we came clean and told the police about this,” she told the court.
The court also heard that Ms Loh suggested gathering other victim stories to support Ms Khan’s false anecdote in a text message on Oct 7, 2021, three days after Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam pressed Ms Khan about her anecdote in Parliament.
Ms Loh said she was trying to help Ms Khan prove her point – that sexual assault victims suffer victim-blaming – by gathering other stories that fit the bill. This was a “grey area to operate”, and would allow Ms Khan to “avoid lying again but still address her original point in Parliament”, she said.
At one point during Ms Loh’s cross-examination, the judge interjected when Mr Jumabhoy tried to drill down on why she was giving a different answer to his question when she had given another answer before the COP.
The lawyer was asking her why her memory was “fuzzy” over whether Singh had told her on Aug 10, 2021, that the matter of Ms Khan’s untruth would not come up again, and what she asked him in relation to the issue.
“The question that was asked at the COP is not the same question you are asking now. Then how can you ask if there’s a different answer?” the judge said. “Your point seems to be asking why are you giving a different answer, but if you’re asking a different question, I don’t know what else you can expect.”
In her testimony to the prosecution, Ms Loh had told the court that she and Mr Nathan had learnt about the untruth during a Zoom call with Ms Khan on Aug 7, 2021.
She said that between Aug 10 and Oct 11, 2021, she did not receive any instructions from the party leaders on clarifying Ms Khan’s lie in Parliament.
The court heard that Ms Loh and Mr Nathan met Singh at the WP chief’s house on the night of Oct 12, 2021.
During this meeting, Singh shared that he had consulted former party chief Low Thia Khiang on the matter the day before, and that the WP veteran had thought the best course of action was to make a clarification in Parliament and “WP would survive the falling out that would follow”.
Singh also recounted that he had a feeling that Ms Khan’s matter would come up at the Oct 4, 2021, Parliament sitting, so he had gone to speak to Ms Khan the day before to “sort of give her a choice of whether or not to come clean in Parliament and that he would not judge her”, Ms Loh recalled.
She told the court that Singh’s recount had surprised her. “I was first surprised that he had the foresight that the matter would come up and also that he would say such a thing to her,” she said. “It felt like very unclear communication, it was vague instruction.”
They later discussed what to include in Ms Khan’s statement to tell the truth, and whether it should include the fact that she is a survivor of sexual assault. Asked by the prosecution if Singh had said he already asked Ms Khan to inform her parents about the sexual assault or had been waiting for her to do so, Ms Loh said no.
Ms Loh also testified that as a media person herself, she knew there was “no way” Ms Khan could have told the truth in Parliament by herself on Oct 4, 2021, without making any preparation.
“This lie is obviously going to be a shock to everyone. If she were to come up and just say ‘Yeah, I lied about it’, it would be very, very foolish of her to just go up and do that without the party,” she said.
For a matter of this magnitude, where the “fallout would be severe to a very high degree”, it was “unthinkable” that she would go into it alone, without the party’s central executive committee knowing and the party managing the crisis communications required, Ms Loh said.
She also told the court that she and Mr Nathan attended a hearing on Nov 25, 2021, by a WP disciplinary panel that comprised Singh, party chairwoman Sylvia Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap.
She recounted that she told Singh he should have stepped up to clarify Ms Khan’s lie in Parliament in October 2021 if he – the Leader of the Opposition – was of the view that it should have been done.
It was not just Ms Khan’s responsibility to keep matters accountable and factual to Parliament, she said.
Ms Loh’s cross-examination continues on Oct 18.
Low Thia Khiang advised that ‘WP would survive the fallout’: Key points from day 4 of Pritam Singh’s trial
Former Workers’ Party (WP) cadre Loh Pei Ying was the second witness to take the stand in the trial of WP chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh, after the prosecution wrapped up former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan’s re-examination within half an hour on the morning of Oct 17.
Singh is fighting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to investigate Ms Khan’s untruth in Parliament.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
Here are the key points that came up on Oct 17, as the trial court sat for the fourth day:
1. Loh views Khan’s lie as a ‘big deal’ and ‘stain on WP’s history’
When Ms Loh took the stand, the court heard that she was a core member of WP’s media team in the 2020 General Election, where Ms Khan was elected as a first-time MP.
By then, Ms Loh, the head and co-founder of editorial company Kontinentalist, had been with WP for almost 10 years. She became Ms Khan’s secretarial assistant and helped the political newbie, who had started volunteering with WP only from the start of 2020, catch up with WP’s history, among other duties, the court heard.
On Aug 7, 2021, Ms Khan confessed over a Zoom video conferencing call to Ms Loh and WP cadre Yudhishthra Nathan that she had lied when Parliament sat on Aug 3.
Ms Loh, who left WP at the end of 2022, sought to clarify the facts during the call, as Ms Khan was emotional and “wasn’t very coherent”.
They also discussed political history, Ms Loh said, noting that Ms Khan, then 27, “had generally quite a poor understanding” of WP’s history.
For instance, Ms Khan did not know former Hougang WP MP Yaw Shin Leong was expelled from the party in 2012 over allegations that he had an extramarital affair with a married woman.
“She did not know that whole thing happened,” Ms Loh told the court.
When she found out about Ms Khan’s untruth on Aug 7, 2021, Ms Loh regarded the matter as a “big deal” and “stain” on WP’s track record for an MP to have lied in that manner. She thus felt uncomfortable to have been made aware of it.
But after she heard from Ms Khan then that Singh had been clued in on the lie earlier on Aug 7, Ms Loh said she felt “a little relieved”, as the WP chief “would know what to do” if something was to be done about it.
2. Low Thia Khiang’s advice was to clarify the lie, and WP would survive the fallout: Loh
The court heard that Ms Loh and Mr Nathan met Singh at the WP chief’s house on the night of Oct 12, 2021.
Ms Loh said that at this “very lengthy” meeting, which took place after dinner, Singh shared that he had consulted former WP chief Low Thia Khiang on the matter the day before, and that the WP veteran had thought the best course of action was to make a clarification in Parliament and “WP would survive the falling out that would follow”.
She and Mr Nathan were “very assuaged” upon hearing that this was Mr Low’s decision and advice, as they had a lot of faith and confidence in the elder’s opinion, Ms Loh told the court.
During the meeting, Singh also recounted that he had a feeling that Ms Khan’s matter would come up at the Oct 4, 2021, Parliament sitting, so he had gone to speak to Ms Khan the day before to “sort of give her a choice of whether or not to come clean in Parliament and that he would not judge her”, Ms Loh recalled.
Asked what she understood by “would not judge her”, Ms Loh said she thought it meant that he would not have a “poor opinion of her regardless of what she did” – specifically whether or not Ms Khan was going to confess or stay silent about her lie in Parliament.
She told the court that Singh’s recount had surprised her. “I was first surprised that he had the foresight that the matter would come up and also that he would say such a thing to her,” she said. “It felt like very unclear communication, it was vague instruction.”
Ms Loh also told the court that the meeting covered how Ms Khan’s Nov 1, 2021, statement before Parliament should be drafted as well.
This was where Ms Loh opined that it was “no good for the party” if the statement omitted the fact that Ms Khan was a sexual assault victim herself, given that this was how she had learnt of the original anecdote referenced in her lie to Parliament.
Singh had considered excluding the fact, she noted. Asked by the prosecution if Singh explained why, Ms Loh said he had said Ms Khan need not include the fact if that was difficult for her to share – what was important was to address that she had lied in Parliament, and he was of the view that a brief statement would be sufficient.
Ms Loh said she felt WP would risk coming across as a party of “compulsive liars” if the motivation behind why Ms Khan had lied was left unaddressed.
Her primary concern would be how sexual assault victims would be perceived after Ms Khan’s confession, since they could be made a “laughing stock, or cast upon as liars”, she added.
Ms Loh also testified that as a media person herself, she knew there was “no way” Ms Khan could have told the truth in Parliament by herself on Oct 4, 2021, without making any preparation.
“This lie is obviously going to be a shock to everyone. If she were to come up and just say ‘Yeah, I lied about it’, it would be very, very foolish of her to just go up and do that without the party,” she said.
For a matter of this magnitude, where the “fallout would be severe to a very high degree”, it was “unthinkable” that she would go into it alone, without the party’s central executive committee knowing and the party managing the crisis communications required.
3. WP disciplinary panel was ‘performatory’ to Loh
The court also heard Ms Loh was “extremely angry” when she received a message on Nov 10, 2021, that a disciplinary panel (DP) convened to look into Ms Khan’s lying controversy was inviting WP members to share their views on the episode.
The panel comprised Singh, party chairwoman Sylvia Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap.
Ms Loh then sent a message to Singh, which read: “Hi Pritam, I’ve tried to reserve my comments on the DP so far but I just saw the message that was sent out to everyone.”
She followed with a text that said it was “plain as day” to her that people involved in Ms Khan’s apology on Nov 1, 2021, were now doing “a little backwards pedalling”.
In another part of the message, which was read out in court, she wrote that the party clearly did not anticipate the backlash despite warnings, and was now trying to do something to quell the anger – an action that she disagreed with.
Ms Loh said she wrote this as she had viewed the DP as “performatory”, done to quell the anger of party members and the public on the matter, but that it would not lead to “drastic actions” being taken against Ms Khan.
The court also heard that she told the WP chief then that she did not think it was “at all fair” to let party members think they had a say in the DP process if this was “done as a mock consultation exercise”. She also urged that the DP be “transparent and share their involvement”.
Giving the context to why she reacted that way, she said “I thought it was dangerous” because everyone else “did not have the full facts” that Singh, Ms Lim and Mr Faisal knew that Ms Khan had lied as early as Aug 8, 2021.
She also noted that the DP was set up amid a groundswell of sentiments that Ms Khan should resign. “Overwhelmingly, people wanted her to resign, and they were eager to distance themselves from (Ms Khan’s) mistake and her lie,” she said.
The court then heard that Singh’s response to her was that party members needed to be given a platform to have their say on the matter rather than “commiserate privately”, to which Ms Loh responded: “I get that, but the DP hasn’t exactly told the party of its knowledge and involvement.”
Ms Loh also followed up by texting: “Their opinions are not accurate because they don’t have the facts.
“Everyone is of the view that we can cut her loose and distance the party from her mistake, but if she is out of the party and she is still subjected to COP (Committee of Privileges), there’s not much we can do about what she says and does there.”
Ms Loh told the court that she said this as her sense was that if party members had known that the leaders were involved, they would take a “significantly different opinion” of the matter.
4. Loh told Singh he should have stepped up and clarified Khan’s lie in October
Ms Loh recounted that she told Singh during a DP hearing on Nov 25, 2021, that he should have stepped up to clarify Ms Khan’s lie in Parliament in October 2021 if he was of the view that it should have been done.
He is Leader of the Opposition, and it was not just Ms Khan’s responsibility to keep matters accountable and factual to Parliament, she said.
She also told the panel that, given Singh knew that a lie had been told, he also had every opportunity to step up and clarify.
Singh got “quite upset” by this remark, pointed at her with a pen and said he had gone to Ms Khan on the night of Oct 3, Ms Loh recalled.
However, before Singh could complete his sentence, Ms Loh said she cut him off, as she still had many points to go through.
Before the panel, Ms Loh also referenced the fact that Singh had similarly made a severe mistake in Parliament before, where he plagiarised his speech about an ombudsman, she added.
The court also heard that Ms Loh had initiated the meeting with the DP, as she realised from a text exchange with Singh that he would not be inviting her and Mr Nathan for questions before the DP – an action that made her feel “intentionally not consulted”.
The meeting was thus to ensure that their thoughts on the matter were put on record, including that they had knowledge of “the true facts”, she told the court.
During the session with the DP, Ms Loh said sacking Ms Khan from the party or having her resign would be a “very severe punishment for something like this”.
She said it would also set a “problematic unprecedented record for the party”, suggesting that resignation would be the only solution if anyone made a mistake.
She added that she told the panel it was “extremely irresponsible” to leave Ms Khan’s minority seat in Compassvale unrepresented and expect the other three MPs to step in.
“Compassvale will never get the proper representation they deserve,” she said. “I also did not think it was up to the MPs – the three of them – to make that call; there is a democratic process to this,” she added.
“It was Raeesah Khan who has been voted into Parliament. To me, it felt convenient that they were using – and I said this to them – they were using precedent set by Halimah Yacob of leaving a minority seat unrepresented, despite WP’s very clear stance against the GRC system, that they just wanted Raeesah Khan out without doing the right thing.”
She said she told the panel that the right thing to do was to also ask the other MPs to step down, allowing Sengkang residents the opportunity to vote again.
5. Khan: ‘You wouldn’t confront your bosses with their own mistake’
When being cross-examined on Oct 16 by Singh’s lawyer, Mr Andre Jumabhoy, Ms Khan had cited “power dynamics” as the reason why she did not mention the WP leaders’ earlier advice for them to take her lie to the grave when she gave her account before the DP on Nov 29, 2021.
Asked by the prosecution on Oct 17 to elaborate on the power imbalance she had referred to, Ms Khan said: “It’s like a conversation with your bosses. You don’t, you wouldn’t confront your bosses with their own mistake.”
Ms Khan spoke about this dynamic again when the prosecution asked her to elaborate on why she had not told Singh or Ms Lim during their meeting on the night of Oct 4, 2021, after she repeated her lie in Parliament, that she got into the mess only because of what they had told her to do.
Earlier, Mr Jumabhoy questioned her about the lack of such a reaction, and she said she never spoke to Singh and Ms Lim in such a manner.
On Oct 17, Ms Khan said: “I never spoke to them in a confrontational way; we didn’t have that kind of relationship. It was more of a ‘This is our advice and you just kind of accept it, and you move on’.”
Again on why she never considered mentioning her leaders’ guidance in any of her draft statements prepared for the Nov 1, 2021, Parliament sitting, where she ultimately admitted to having lied, Ms Khan reiterated that she wanted to protect her leaders.
“I wanted to take the full consequences of my action. I wanted to take full responsibility of what I had done,” she added.
6. Singh was ‘composed and relaxed’ during Aug 10, 2021, meeting
When the prosecution was leading her evidence, Ms Loh said she and Singh had “avoided saying things out loud” when they met on Aug 10, 2021, at the Aljunied-Hougang Town Council office in Eunos, where she said they shared a mutual understanding that Ms Khan had told a lie in Parliament.
Noting that Singh had requested the meeting to discuss a code of conduct for WP members and volunteers, she told the court she asked about his knowledge of Ms Khan “with an understanding that she had lied”, although they explicitly referenced the fact that Ms Khan was a victim of sexual assault.
“He sort of confirmed that he understood what I was referencing and I talked about sexual assault survivors’ experiences,” she recalled.
Asked about the manner in which they communicated, Ms Loh said there was then a “prevalent belief” among Mr Nathan, Ms Khan and her that their phones may be bugged as she had received a text from Apple saying that “state forces” were trying to access her phone.
Singh, she noted, was also “generally worried about this”, so she had had to hand over her phone for safe keeping in a drawer behind him when they met.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Ben Mathias Tan asked how Singh had “sort of confirmed” his understanding of Ms Khan’s lie at this meeting, and Ms Loh said: “I asked him, has (Ms Khan) told you about the matter, and he nodded his head.”
Queried if she had asked Singh about whether the untruth would come up at that time, she said her memory is “fuzzy” on this, but recalled that she might have asked something to that effect since he had nodded his head, “affirming that it probably wouldn’t come up again”.
But she specifically remembered that Singh did not seem angry about Ms Khan’s lie during this meeting as he was “composed and relaxed”.
On why she did not respond to Ms Khan’s Aug 8, 2021, text mentioning Singh’s advice to take her lie “to the grave”, she said they had avoided discussing the lie over text messages as there was a general awareness that the lie was “severe”.
Upon further questioning by Mr Jumabhoy about this, she said she did not “fully register” the message until much later, on Nov 29, 2021, after receiving an invocation to appear before the COP.
She “had a visceral response” when she finally registered it, she added.
Pritam Singh's trial: Day 3 (16 Oct 2024)
Pritam’s lawyer continues to raise doubts over Raeesah’s credibility on day 3 of WP chief’s trial
Whether former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan’s evidence could be relied upon continued to be the subject of cross-examination on Oct 16, the third day of Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh’s trial.
Singh’s lawyer, Mr Andre Jumabhoy, sought to take the court through inconsistencies in Ms Khan’s statements to the police and the Committee of Privileges, and the evidence she had given since the trial began on Oct 14.
This was as the defence had, on Oct 15, applied to impeach Ms Khan’s credibility as a witness.
If successful, what Ms Khan says in court would be given less weight by the judge.
In the morning, Mr Jumabhoy showed that Ms Khan’s statement to the police on May 12, 2022, was that Singh told her on Oct 3, 2021, that “knowing them (the Government), they may bring it up again”, and if her untrue anecdote was brought up in Parliament on Oct 4, he would not judge her if she kept to her lie.
However, Ms Khan said on the first day of the trial that Singh had told her on Oct 3 that he did not think the issue would come up again, but that if it did, he would not judge her for continuing with her narrative.
Asked if there was a difference between her two accounts, Ms Khan at first said they were different ways of saying the same thing, but later agreed that there was a difference.
Mr Jumabhoy then pointed to an Oct 1, 2021, e-mail that Singh had sent to all current WP MPs reminding them of the serious consequences they would face if they could not back up what they said in Parliament.
The lawyer noted that Singh had mentioned this e-mail to Ms Khan when they met on Oct 3. Her testimony that he then told her he would not judge her if she continued her narrative could not be true.
“Would you agree that that’s simply absurd? It’s so absurd that, in fact, it didn’t happen (and) he never told you to continue the narrative,” said Mr Jumabhoy.
Ms Khan disagreed. Asked why she did not question Singh on what appeared to be two contradicting messages, she said the WP chief had told her he would not judge her if she kept up her narrative, and she had left it at that.
The defence made a separate impeachment application based on Ms Khan’s Oct 4 text to Singh. When Minister for Law and Home Affairs K. Shanmugam raised the matter of her untrue anecdote in Parliament, she had texted the WP chief: “What should I do pritam”.
Mr Jumabhoy argued that the message was “materially contradictory” to her evidence in court.
This is because Ms Khan told the court she had lied again in Parliament on Oct 4 as she had Singh’s support to do so, while in her written statement, she said it was because Singh did not reply to her message and she was waiting for guidance.
“There can’t be a more bare-faced contradiction to what she’s saying there,” the lawyer told the court.
But Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock said the message aligned with the gist of her evidence, which was to continue her narrative. When confronted by Mr Shanmugam in Parliament, Ms Khan had sought Singh’s assurance that he held to the same position from their meeting the day before, he added.
It was “completely inappropriate” for the defence to rely on just a particular sentence to look at whether Ms Khan’s credibility should be impeached, said the prosecutor.
Citing case law, he noted that the bar for impeachment is high.
“Impeachment is a process which is not lightly gone into. The court must be satisfied that there is a serious or material discrepancy,” he said.
On this point, Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan ruled that he did not see a contradiction in Ms Khan’s statements, let alone a material contradiction.
He agreed with Mr Ang that Ms Khan’s court testimony cannot be read in isolation.
In the afternoon, the defence argued that Ms Khan had contradicted herself about whether she had intended to come clean in September 2021, and as such there were grounds for impeachment.
Mr Jumabhoy noted that evidence provided to the Committee of Privileges showed that Ms Khan had said she “might have” considered telling the truth then, but did not attend Parliament that month as she was down with shingles.
This piece of evidence was from Ms Khan’s statement to the police. The lawyer had tried to get a related portion of the police statement admitted in court as part of his bid to impeach Ms Khan’s credibility.
He said her answers appeared to contradict his earlier exchange with Ms Khan in court.
He had asked if she had contemplated coming clean in September 2021, and she replied no. This was because she thought the matter had been dropped.
“There’s no suggestion that she’s not coming clean because she was asked to take the matter to the grave or asked to continue the narrative,” he argued.
Mr Jumabhoy was referring to Ms Khan’s evidence that the WP leaders had told her to take the matter to the grave on Aug 8, 2021, and Singh telling her on Oct 3 that he would not judge her if she continued her narrative.
However, the prosecution pointed out that as a general rule, when statements are reduced to question and answer form, if something is lost in the process, it cannot be considered a discrepancy.
“An omission is hardly a discrepancy. Just because you omit to say that there is another reason, that is not a discrepancy,” said Mr Ang.
He noted that witnesses can be cross-examined further on an inconsistency only if there are serious discrepancies or material contradictions which go to the crux of the charges. There was no material discrepancy here, he added.
The judge rejected the defence’s application. He said he failed to see a contradiction as the questions asked of Ms Khan were not the same.
Mr Jumabhoy wrapped up his cross-examination of Ms Khan by putting to her the defence’s position. He said that at their meeting on Aug 8, 2021, Singh had told her to speak to her parents, and that they would deal with her untruth thereafter. The WP leaders never told her at that meeting to take her lie to the grave, he added.
Ms Khan disagreed.
The prosecution is expected to wrap up its re-examination of Ms Khan on Oct 17. Ms Loh Pei Ying, a former WP cadre, is the next witness to take the stand.
‘You’re not a teenager’: 5 key points as defence wraps up Raeesah Khan’s testimony at WP chief’s trial
Singh is contesting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in 2021 to investigate Ms Khan’s untruth in Parliament.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
Here are five key points that came up on Oct 16:
1. ‘You didn’t need a directive to lie’
Defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy pointed to Ms Khan’s statement on Dec 22, 2021, to the Committee of Privileges (COP), where she said Singh did not give her a “directive” to clarify the untruth.
The lawyer noted that she was 27 years old at that time and “not a teenager” when she was expecting this directive, and that she did not seem to need a directive to lie to Parliament. Yet, she needed a directive to tell the truth, he added.
Ms Khan said it was because she wanted Singh’s advice, given that she had made a mistake, as her party leaders were far more experienced in politics than she was.
“Naturally when I’ve done something wrong, I’ve gone to my leaders and I’ve asked them what I should do because I’m terrified that I’ve made this mistake,” she added.
Mr Jumabhoy put it to her that the WP’s leaders never told her in a meeting days after her untruth to Parliament on Aug 3, 2021, that they should take the lie to the grave. Ms Khan disagreed.
The lawyer also said Ms Khan had stuck to her lie in Parliament on Oct 4 as she was frightened that telling the truth would expose her as a liar.
Ms Khan said this was partly the reason, but she had also relied on Singh’s advice a day earlier that he would not judge her if she continued her narrative.
2. Why no anger at ‘bad advice’ from WP leaders
The defence said Ms Khan should have been angry with the WP leadership if they had advised her to maintain her untruth in Parliament on Oct 4, since it became clear then that the police intended to seriously investigate her allegation.
“Wouldn’t you naturally have been fuming, angry, with the party leadership?” asked Mr Jumabhoy.
Ms Khan said she only remembered feeling “really terrified”, and just trusting what her party leaders wanted her to do.
The lawyer then noted that on the evening of Oct 4, Ms Khan had met Singh and WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim at the Leader of the Opposition’s office in the House, and again did not express any unhappiness, which would have been the natural response if she had relied on what in retrospect was bad advice.
This is because Singh never told her to lie in the first place, said Mr Jumabhoy. The WP chief also did not ask her to lie again on Oct 4, and that it was Ms Khan’s own decision to do so.
Ms Khan disagreed.
The defence also noted that Ms Khan had told then WP cadres Loh Pei Ying and Yudhishthra Nathan that Singh and Ms Lim had been “really great” a day later on Oct 5, the same people who she claimed had told her to lie.
Ms Khan said she was referring to how they had taken the time to give her advice, and what she “saw as compassion from them at that time”.
3. ‘Power dynamics’ the reason why Ms Khan did not mention WP leaders’ advice at party’s disciplinary panel
The defence noted that Ms Khan had asked for a second meeting with WP’s disciplinary panel – consisting of Singh, Ms Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap – which took place on Nov 29, 2021.
Prior to the meeting, she had a text exchange with Singh which Ms Khan said shocked her, as it felt like the WP chief was trying to make it seem as if he had not been advising her all along on her untruth.
Mr Jumabhoy noted that, despite this, Ms Khan did not mention to the disciplinary panel that it had been their instruction for her to maintain her lie.
She responded that context was missing – it was her facing three “very powerful people” who had been advising her, and who now pretended they had not.
“When you are confronted by people you view as giants, it’s very hard to confront them in a negative way,” she said.
4. WP cadres advised Raeesah Khan to ‘lawyer up’
The court heard that after Ms Khan’s exchange with Minister for Law and Home Affairs K. Shanmugam on Oct 4, 2021, Ms Loh and Mr Nathan had advised Ms Khan to get legal advice.
Ms Loh and Mr Nathan had both assisted Ms Khan in her duties when she was an MP, including giving input on her parliamentary speeches.
In a newly set up chat group, Ms Loh suggested that Ms Khan “lawyer up”, while Mr Nathan advised her to be careful about what she told the lawyer.
Mr Jumabhoy asked if the two WP cadres were aware of the fact that she had lied to Parliament twice by then, and Ms Khan said “yes”. He asked if they had told her to own up to her lies, and she said they did not.
The lawyer then asked if Ms Loh’s advice was “effectively trying to block an investigation”, and if Mr Nathan was advising her against telling the lawyer everything. Ms Khan disagreed, and said they were suggesting that she get legal advice and be careful.
5. Ms Khan met the WP cadres to discuss their evidence before COP hearing
The court also heard that Ms Khan met Ms Loh, Mr Nathan and another WP volunteer, Mr Lim Hang Ling, on the night of Dec 1, 2021. Ms Khan and Ms Loh gave evidence to the Committee of Privileges on Dec 2.
Mr Jumabhoy asked if Ms Khan had contacted Ms Loh to meet in order to “come up with a story by aligning your facts”. Ms Khan denied this, and said they had met to make sure that both of them were doing okay.
Asked if she had discussed what she wanted to say in her evidence, Ms Khan said: “Not that much.” She later conceded that she had discussed the evidence she wanted to give to the Committee of Privileges.
Ms Khan said that at that point, she still wanted to protect Singh as much as she could, but Ms Loh had rightly pointed out that they had to be honest if the committee asked specific questions about when the WP leaders knew about her untruth. “I wasn’t intending to lie, I was just hoping to take full responsibility at the (Committee of Privileges),” she said.
Mr Jumabhoy asked Ms Khan whether it would have been a lie had she done so, and she agreed.
Pritam Singh's trial: Day 2 (15 Oct 2024)
Pritam Singh’s lawyer paints Raeesah Khan as habitual liar in bid to impeach witness’ credit
Defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy, who is representing Workers’ Party (WP) chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh, sought to paint former WP MP Raeesah Khan as a habitual liar from the moment her cross-examination began on Oct 15.
After more apparent inconsistencies were put to Ms Khan, it became clear that this was part of the defence’s bid to impeach Ms Khan’s credit as a witness.
Such impeachment can happen if a witness gives testimony that is inconsistent with his or her former statements, according to the Evidence Act.
The attempt sparked a 30-minute debate on the second day of Singh’s trial around whether there was really a discrepancy in Ms Khan’s testimony.
Mr Jumabhoy, a former prosecutor, argued that Ms Khan’s statement to the police should be allowed as evidence for purposes of this impeachment process.
Ms Khan had to step out of the courtroom while these arguments were made, but the court was adjourned for the day before the matter was resolved.
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan is expected to continue to hear the defence’s argument for impeachment on Oct 16, when Singh’s trial resumes.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively.She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
If convicted, Singh could be fined up to $7,000, jailed for up to three years, or both, on each charge.
Lies upon lies
The defence’s three-hour cross-examination was littered with charged moments.
On one occasion, Mr Jumabhoy confronted Ms Khan with the question: “You are, in fact, a liar, correct? You tell lies non-stop, don’t you?”
“Yes, I lied,” Ms Khan said in response to the first question. She also asked what Mr Jumabhoy meant by “non-stop”.
In another instance, Mr Jumabhoy sought to show that Ms Khan had built upon her original lie with more lies, noting that she had managed to lie at least four times in a message to Singh. “That’s pretty impressive by any stretch of the imagination,” the lawyer said.
The message in question was Ms Khan’s response to Singh when he asked, soon after she delivered her untrue anecdote in Parliament on Aug 3, 2021, if she was still in contact with the woman mentioned.
Ms Khan had told Singh then that the incident took place three years earlier in the early part of the year, and that she had met the victim at a bus stop near Bedok police station.
In response to Mr Jumabhoy’s statement, Ms Khan said: “I wouldn’t call it impressive, I would call it fear”. He then remarked that she is “seen to be well-thinking enough” to add facts to support her accounts.
Ms Khan then said: “I would think being well-thinking would be coming out with the truth.”
The defence also had her reaffirming her other lies to Singh, including that the number of the person who put the victim in touch with her was not working any more, or that she was not in touch with an organisation but rather “someone who came into my friend’s radar”.
At one point, Mr Jumabhoy asked about the lies she made in text messages, saying: “You’re adding more substance, aren’t you?”, “You’re adding more facts to support a lie”, and “So it’s a lie heaped upon a lie. And it’s going to be wrapped up in more lies isn’t it?”.
Ms Khan agreed to all these statements.
When Mr Jumabhoy asked if that was how she treated someone she revered – a point she had made when questioned by the prosecution – she said she allowed her lies to snowball as she feared disappointing Singh.
She later told the court that she could have continued lying, but chose to admit the lie over a phone call to Singh on Aug 7.
The lawyer put it to her that Singh had to ask her “point-blank whether the anecdote was true”, and that she had not volunteered the information. She agreed.
Mr Jumabhoy also asked if she had clarified what exactly the WP leaders wanted her to “take to the grave” during the Aug 8, 2021 meeting. That day, she had confessed her lie to Singh, Ms Sylvia Lim and Mr Faisal Manap.
She said she did not clarify.
With that, the lawyer put it to her that it was her assumption that the leaders had wanted her to take her lie in Parliament to the grave, and she said: “Yes”.
‘Substantiate?’
Mr Jumabhoy also sought to discredit Ms Khan based on her testimony before the Committee of Privileges (COP) in 2021. During that hearing, she said she did not know what Singh meant when he circled the problematic anecdote on a printed copy of her Aug 3 speech before it was delivered, and wrote “Substantiate?” next to it.
Mr Jumabhoy read out text messages between Singh and Ms Khan on Aug 3, shortly after she delivered the speech containing the lie. In them, Singh said: “I had a feeling this would happen. I highlighted this part in your draft speech. You should write to the police to clarify this matter.”
She had told Singh: “I thought I edited it enough to remove this possibility.”
If she had edited the statement, why did she say “no” when earlier asked if she made an edit based on Singh’s comment, Mr Jumabhoy asked.
At this point, Ms Khan asked the lawyer to repeat or rephrase his questions several times, as he continued to poke at this apparent inconsistency.
After she asked for clarity a third time, Mr Jumabhoy read out her text message again. “That’s your message there. You are now telling Mr Singh a lie.”
“What was your question again?” Ms Khan asked.
The lawyer repeated his question another time, and Ms Khan answered “no” when asked if she was telling Singh a lie in that instance.
This was because she thought she had already edited the speech enough before Singh’s feedback, and thus did not make further edits after seeing his comment, she added.
During the COP hearing, Ms Khan had also said: “At that point in time, I did not understand what that meant but, upon reflection, I understand now why he circled it and why he said what he said.”
She repeated this in her testimony on Oct 14, adding that she did not make further changes to the speech even after seeing Singh’s comment as she “didn’t really understand the severity of what he wrote”.
“I thought if it was something important, he would sit down and have a conversation with me, but he didn’t, so I didn’t make any changes,” she said in court when questioned by the prosecution.
Mr Jumabhoy later asked point-blank if Ms Khan was saying it is true she did not understand what “substantiate” meant, despite the evidence that she had given so far in court.
Ms Khan said nothing, prompting the judge to say: “You’d want to respond to that”.
“No, I don’t think I’ve anything else to say to that,” Ms Khan said.
Mr Jumabhoy then said her evidence to the COP was that she “didn’t understand” what substantiate meant, whereas her statement in court was that she understands the term to mean “make sure it happened” or “make sure it is true”. This is fundamentally different, he added.
Ms Khan told the court that she feels like she is saying the same things in different ways.
Defence says message on taking info to the grave was ‘never sent’
The defence also suggested that it appears that Ms Khan’s message to WP cadres Loh Pei Ying and Yudhishthra Nathan on Aug 8, 2021 about taking “the information to the grave” was never sent, since no one responded to it.
In leading the evidence towards this, Mr Jumabhoy said Ms Khan was aware that the message was significant, but decided not to mention it until after Ms Loh had brought it up before the COP.
He pointed out that the message in question was deleted from her phone and had to be extracted from Mr Nathan’s phone.
Ms Khan said her phone was “a really old phone” that was “constantly crashing”, which was why she deleted a number of mobile applications, including WhatsApp.
Later, Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock sought to clarify if the defence’s position was that the message was forged or not sent.
Mr Jumabhoy said given that Ms Loh and Mr Nathan did not react to the message, “it appears that it was never sent”.
The judge interjected to say he did not understand the point being made, adding: “They didn’t react means she didn’t send? They might have many reasons not to react? I think we can leave it to that.”
Prosecution objects to impeachment application
Near the end of the session, the prosecution protested when Mr Jumabhoy sought to establish that Ms Khan had produced one version of evidence in front of the court, and another in her statement to the police.
Singh had sent an e-mail on Oct 1, 2021 reminding MPs of parliamentary protocol, which Ms Khan had described in court as “almost a dig at me”. But Mr Jumabhoy noted that Ms Khan said “something quite different” to the police – that she was frightened that the untruth would be brought up in Parliament.
Mr Ang objected to the defence lawyer’s “liberal” referencing of police statements, noting that there must be a “material inconsistency” before he could do so.
“I’ve not objected so far because I am waiting for him to come to a material discrepancy. Surely, he must tell the court what it is,” Mr Ang said.
The judge agreed, saying that the discrepancy to launch this impeachment process has to be “material”, but the defence had not “really laid the ground for that”.
This was why he had a problem with how Ms Khan’s questioning had gone, he said.
Ms Khan was then asked to leave the courtroom for the defence to make its application, following which both lawyers rose to their feet. Mr Ang said he was struggling to understand Mr Jumabhoy’s characterisation of the discrepancy, adding that he was not sure why Ms Khan’s reaction to the e-mail was material.
“The simple point is that this e-mail speaks for itself. All of us can read it,” Mr Ang said.
He then said: “All this other evidence of whether it was a dig and whether she felt fear, all this is not the main point. One does not go through the whole impeachment procedure for something that is not really material.”
Mr Jumabhoy insisted that what Ms Khan presented as evidence in relation to the e-mail involved “two fundamentally different reactions”.
He also argued that Singh’s e-mail on Oct 1 “has to be a nudge” to clarify her untruth if viewed against the evidence of her police statement.
But Mr Ang said Ms Khan did not state if she viewed the e-mail as a nudge, direction or push to clarify the untruth.
She read it as a warning to all WP members that they have to substantiate any anecdotes made in Parliament, and not a direction to correct the lie she had already made, he noted.
Another inconsistency in question related to what Singh said on Oct 3 about whether Ms Khan’s issue would be brought up in Parliament.
The defence highlighted that Ms Khan had said in her police statement that Singh told her the issue is likely to be brought up, but said in court that he told her it is unlikely that the issue would come up.
The debate will continue on Oct 16.
Singh is represented by Mr Jumabhoy and Mr Aristotle Emmanuel Eng Zhen Yang, from Mr Jumabhoy’s law firm. Singh’s father, Mr Amarjit Singh, a former district judge, is also part of his legal team.
‘They already made up their minds’: Key points from Raeesah Khan’s evidence on day 2 of WP chief’s trial
By Wong Pei Ting and Tham Yuen-C, The Straits Times, 16 Oct 2024
The prosecution wrapped up former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan’s evidence on the morning of Oct 15, the second day of Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh’s trial.
Singh, who is Leader of the Opposition, is contesting two charges overhis alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to investigate Ms Khan’s untruth in Parliament.
Here are three key points from Ms Khan’s evidence to the prosecution:
1. Ms Khan was surprised by WP leaders’ decision to put her through disciplinary hearing
Ms Khan said she was informed by WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim on Nov 2, 2021, that the party had formed a disciplinary panel (DP) against her.
Ms Lim told her over e-mail that the panel – consisting of Singh, Ms Lim and WP vice-chairman Faisal Manap – was tasked to investigate her lying episode and make recommendations to the party’s central executive committee (CEC) on steps to be taken against her.
But when she went before the panel on Nov 8, Ms Khan was surprised to find the WP leaders “sitting on kind of a stage”, and that she was “confronted” with questions about her character and general conduct as an MP, rather than her untruth to Parliament.
A big point of contention during the meeting was that she did not submit enough parliamentary questions and was not adequately present in Parliament and on the ground. Singh also spoke about her lack of discipline and punctuality, and that she was “on borrowed time” if the CEC allowed her to continue as an MP, she told the court.
Ms Khan said she was dumbfounded by the DP’s line of questioning. Two weeks after the meeting, she messaged Singh to seek a second meeting with the DP to speak on her record.
In response, Singh said not being prepared for the DP was “not becoming of an MP”, as the DP session was a very formal meeting. He told her to e-mail the panel to request a second hearing.
Ms Khan then met the DP on Nov 29, but came away from the session feeling “defeated and betrayed”. She felt that the WP leaders had already made up their minds that she had to resign.
The same leaders she had looked up to and trusted had used the DP to “almost pretend” that they had not been guiding her on her untruth since Aug 8, said Ms Khan.
Asked why she did not mention to the DP Singh’s Oct 3 advice to her to keep to her lie, Ms Khan said she assumed that the WP leaders already knew about it as “they talked to each other about everything”.
“I realised they weren’t really listening, they were just kind of writing down what I said,” she said.
2. What happened to ‘I won’t judge you’?
Deputy Public Prosecutor Sivakumar Ramasamy also led evidence on messages between Ms Khan and WP cadres Loh Pei Ying and Yudhishthra Nathan around the time of the WP DP proceedings.
On Nov 13, 2021, Ms Khan disclosed to the two WP cadres that Singh had told her there would be no point continuing if she did not have the support of her teammates, which she took to mean he wanted her to resign.
In response, Mr Nathan said: “And he gets off scot-free, (because) now people don’t know that he knew that it was a lie?”
He noted that she would still be subjected to the Committee of Privileges as a former MP, and “could damage Pritam’s reputation” with the truth. Ms Khan replied: “I wouldn’t do that.”
Ms Khan also forwarded to the cadres some of her Nov 22 correspondence with Singh to request a second meeting with the DP.
Singh had told her that her character and behaviour were under review by the DP because of her actions in Parliament, and her decision to stick to her untruth on Oct 4.
Mr Nathan replied: “What happened to ‘I won’t judge you’?”
3. Why Ms Khan decided to tell the Committee of Privileges about WP leaders’ knowledge of her untruth
Having earlier decided to protect WP’s leaders regarding her untruth, Ms Khan was asked at what point she decided to tell the Committee of Privileges the truth about their involvement.
Ms Khan said there was no way she could evade questions about when the party leaders first knew about her lie after Ms Loh shared their Aug 8, 2021, text messages with the committee.
Ms Loh, followed by Ms Khan, had testified to the committee on Dec 2, 2021.
Ms Khan also noted that the WP leaders themselves had held a press conference on Dec 2 – the first day of the Committee of Privileges’ hearings – to detail when they knew about her untruth.
Singh told reporters that Ms Khan had told WP leaders about a week after she first spoke the untruth in Parliament, but they had decided to give her time to deal with the matter.
This was as Ms Khan had told them she was herself a victim of sexual assault, but had not told her family about it.
Pritam Singh's trial: Day 1 (14 Oct 2024)
WP chief Pritam Singh lied to downplay his responsibility in Raeesah Khan’s untruth, says prosecution
After he found out former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan had lied in Parliament, Workers’ Party (WP) chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh told a parliamentary committee investigating the matter that he had asked her to clarify the untruth to the House.
In reality, Singh had, on two different occasions, told Ms Khan to maintain her lie, said the prosecution on Oct 14, the first day of Singh’s trial.
This meant that in attempting to downplay his own responsibility in Ms Khan’s lying controversy, he had provided false testimony to the Committee of Privileges, it added.
Ms Khan admitted in Parliament on Nov 1, 2021, that she had misled Parliament on Aug 3 and Oct 4, 2021, when she claimed and then restated that she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively.
She had first disclosed her lie to Singh on Aug 7, 2021.
The committee that investigated Ms Khan’s lie held hearings for seven days between Dec 2 and Dec 22, 2021, and its report was debated in Parliament on Feb 15, 2022, which was when the House resolved to refer Singh to the public prosecutor for a further probe.
Singh was charged on March 19, 2024. He is contesting two charges under the Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act, which makes it an offence to lie in response to questions posed by Parliament or its committee.
If convicted, he could be fined up to $7,000, jailed for up to three years, or both, on each charge.
Calling on Ms Khan as the trial’s first witness, the prosecution sought to show how Singh and other WP leaders had, in meetings with her on Aug 8 and Oct 3, 2021, told her to keep to her lie, and had advised her to clarify her untruth only on Oct 12 that year.
From Aug 9 to Oct 3, nothing was done in relation to any public statements she should make on the matter.
But after Oct 11, the party’s leaders were deeply involved in preparing her public statements. These included nine drafts of a personal statement that Ms Khan made in Parliament on Nov 1 admitting to her untruth.
In his opening statement, Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock said the prosecution’s witnesses will include former WP chief Low Thia Khiang.
Mr Low was informed of Ms Khan’s untrue anecdote to Parliament by Singh and WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim on Oct 11, 2021.
Mr Ang said Singh, 48, lied to the committee in December 2021 about what he wanted Ms Khan to do about her Aug 3, 2021, untruth in Parliament.
Contrary to what he told the committee, Singh had, at the Aug 8 meeting, been prepared for Ms Khan and the WP leaders to “take (the matter) to the grave”.
“It was clear to Ms Khan then that her party leaders did not want her to clarify the untruth and that she could leave the matter be,” Mr Ang said.
When they met again on Oct 3, Singh did not tell Ms Khan she should clarify the matter if it came up in Parliament the next day, said Mr Ang. Instead, Singh gave Ms Khan the impression that she could choose to continue with her narrative and that he would not judge her if she did so.
Singh, a trained lawyer and experienced politician, had “even on his account to the Committee of Privileges” told Ms Khan that he would not judge her, Mr Ang stressed. “I think that is self-explanatory,” he said.
“We will show that the inexorable conclusion to be drawn is that the accused had guided Ms Khan on Oct 3, 2021, to maintain the untruth if the matter was raised in Parliament on Oct 4, 2021,” he said.
When Singh, Ms Lim and Ms Khan met in the evening of Oct 4 after that day’s Parliament sitting, neither WP leader told Ms Khan to clarify the untruth. Instead, it is the prosecution’s case that Singh had told Ms Khan that it was “too late” to do so, Mr Ang said.
The trial, which has been fixed for 16 days until Nov 13, is being heard before Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan at the State Courts.
Before trial proceedings began proper, Singh’s charges were read to him again, and the WP chief reiterated his earlier not-guilty plea before a courtroom with almost 40 people in the gallery.
The WP chief was seated a row behind his lawyers. His father Amarjit Singh, a former district judge who is part of his legal team, was seated beside him. Notable figures in the gallery included WP MPs Faisal Manap, Gerald Giam, Jamus Lim and Louis Chua, and social media influencer Wendy Cheng, better known as Xiaxue.
Mr Ang said “there was simply no way” that Singh intended for Ms Khan’s lies to be clarified when Parliament sat on Oct 4, 2021, as the accused had claimed.
This was because no preparatory steps were taken then, compared with after the Oct 11, 2021, meeting that involved Mr Low.
At that meeting, Mr Low advised Singh and Ms Khan to clarify the untruth in Parliament as soon as possible.
Subsequently, Ms Khan underwent “careful preparations” in the lead-up to her eventual clarification to Parliament, noted the prosecution.
The WP central executive committee (CEC) also met on Oct 29, 2021, and heard Ms Khan deliver a draft of the statement that she would read in Parliament, and the CEC members had the opportunity to comment on the draft.
Mr Ang noted that there was no discussion about the untrue anecdote between Singh and Ms Khan from Aug 8 to Oct 3, 2021, let alone the fact that it ought to be clarified in Parliament.
“September came and went. We come to October. Between Aug 8 and Oct 2, silence by the accused person. Not a whisper from him about this untruth, what to do, whether (Ms Khan) had to correct it, how to correct it. It’s as if the matter had been buried,” Mr Ang told the court.
After the Oct 11 meeting with Mr Low – who remains a member of the WP CEC – Singh, Ms Khan and Ms Lim met a day later. That was when Singh and Ms Lim told Ms Khan that the issue would not go away and that she should clarify the untruth in Parliament, said the prosecution.
The prosecution’s case is thus that until Oct 11, 2021, none of WP’s leaders had instructed Ms Khan to clarify her untruth with the police or in Parliament, Mr Ang added.
Singh is represented by former prosecutor Andre Jumabhoy and Mr Aristotle Emmanuel Eng Zhen Yang, from Mr Jumabhoy’s law firm.
Other than Mr Low and Ms Khan, the prosecution said it would call two former WP cadres, Ms Loh Pei Ying and Mr Yudhishthra Nathan, as witnesses.
Both had assisted Ms Khan in her MP duties and had “several important interactions” with her and Singh. For instance, Ms Khan had updated them via WhatsApp shortly after her Oct 3 meeting with the WP leaders that “they’ve agreed that the best thing to do is to take the information to the grave”.
“The totality of the evidence will demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that (Singh) had falsely testified on the two matters set out in the charges, and (he) ought therefore to be convicted of both the charges,” said Mr Ang.
The prosecution said it would be able to wrap up Ms Khan’s evidence on the morning of Oct 15, which means it would be the defence’s turn to cross-examine the former MP.
‘I revered him’: 7 key points from former WP MP Raeesah Khan’s testimony in Pritam Singh trial
Former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan is the first witness the prosecution called to testify on Oct 14, the first day of the trial of Workers’ Party (WP) chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh.
Singh is contesting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to look into the lying controversy involving Ms Khan.
Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station,where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.
Here are seven points that surfaced from Ms Khan’s testimony on the first day of the trial:
1. Singh suggested that WP leaders and Ms Khan take her untruth ‘to the grave’
After relating the anecdote in Parliament on Aug 3, she admitted to Singh that it was untrue on Aug 7 after persistent questioning from the WP chief.
From that meeting, which was when she disclosed her lie to WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim and vice-chairman Faisal Manap, Ms Khan said her understanding was that she did not have to do anything.
This was after Ms Lim told her that the anecdote would probably not come up again. She also received no advice from the WP leaders on actions to be taken, whether it be to draft a speech, make a clarification, or e-mail the police with more information, she said.
Right after the meeting ended at around 12.40pm, Ms Khan sent a message to WP cadres Loh Pei Ying and Yudhishthra Nathan about what transpired, which was that she had told the WP leaders about her untruth and “they said it would be best to take the info to the grave”.
Ms Khan said she did so as she had admitted her lie to the two party cadres, whom she called her close friends in WP, and wanted to keep them updated.
2. ‘He wouldn’t judge me for continuing to lie’
Singh next met Ms Khan at her home on Oct 3, 2021, where they had a private chat at the corner of her living room.
He told her that her lie was unlikely to come up in Parliament the next day. But if it did, he would not judge her for continuing the narrative, recounted Ms Khan.
Asked what she meant by “continuing the narrative”, Ms Khan said it meant continuing to lie. This made her feel confident that she had his support, and grateful as he had gone to see her at her home, she added.
Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam raised the issue the next day. Four minutes into his ministerial statement, Ms Khan sent Singh the message: “What should I do, Pritam?”
She had hoped that Singh would reaffirm what he said the day before, but he did not reply. She kept up her lie, and said she was unable to reach the victim in her anecdote.
That night, Ms Khan met Singh and Ms Lim at the Leader of the Opposition’s office. She offered to tell the truth, but Singh told her “it’s too late for that”, she said.
3. Party leaders were deeply involved in Ms Khan’s public statements
The prosecution’s line of questioning sought to show the degree of involvement that WP’s leaders had in key public statements by Ms Khan, including her statement to address the fallout around Muslim issues from her Aug 3, 2021, speech in Parliament.
This draft statement, prepared on Aug 8, was shared with Singh to “get his approval”, as well as Mr Faisal for his input, said Ms Khan.
The court heard that Singh sent a version he had edited to Ms Khan, and told her to “read this version carefully, word by word” and to let him know what she thought. Ms Khan then made some further edits, and after Singh gave his go-ahead, she posted it on Facebook.
In contrast, her understanding from the Aug 8 meeting was to not do anything about her untrue anecdote, she said.
It was only on Oct 12 that Ms Khan said she was advised by WP leaders to clarify her untruth. At a meeting with Singh and Ms Lim at his house, the WP chief said it would be best for her to tell the truth, and Ms Khan was told to draft a statement and to deliver it when Parliament next sat.
Nine drafts were eventually prepared in the lead-up to her clarification on Nov 1, 2021. This was because there was some back and forth on what she should say, taking in points from Singh, Ms Lim, Ms Loh and Mr Nathan.
WP leaders were also closely involved in her public apology when some old Facebook posts of hers resurfaced after she was put forward as a candidate for the 2020 General Election, prompting her to have to “make a short speech” to the media in the lead-up to the polls.
When Deputy Public Prosecutor Sivakumar Ramasamy asked if anyone had helped her with this speech, Ms Khan said the media team had helped, with Singh giving his input as well.
4. Ms Khan ‘wanted to protect’ her leaders
In her Nov 1, 2021, statement in Parliament admitting to her lie, Ms Khan did not mention that she had disclosed her untruth to Singh on Aug 7 and to the other WP leaders on Aug 8.
Asked why, she said she wanted to protect them, and did not want to implicate anybody else in her mistake.
The prosecution then asked her why she omitted to mention Singh’s Oct 3 advice to her to maintain her lie, when quizzed by Leader of the House Indranee Rajah on Nov 1 as to why she repeated her lie to Parliament on Oct 4.
To this, Ms Khan reiterated her earlier point about wanting to protect her party leaders, and to take full responsibility for her mistake.
After she delivered her Nov 1 statement, Singh said she did well and he was there if she needed anything else from him. Ms Khan said the messages made her feel comforted and supported.
5. Ms Khan underestimated need to substantiate her Aug 3, 2021, speech
Recounting her speech that contained the untrue anecdote, Ms Khan said Singh had seen the anecdote on the morning of the Parliament sitting. He had circled a part of it and wrote the word “substantiate” on a printed copy of the speech before returning it to her.
Ms Khan, however, did not make any further changes to the speech as she “didn’t really understand the severity of what he wrote”, she told the court.
“I thought if it was something important, he would sit down and have a conversation with me, but he didn’t, so I didn’t make any changes,” she added.
DPP Ramasamy followed up by asking what she understood by the word “substantiate”, and Ms Khan said she thought it meant that she “had to make sure it happened”.
She said she kept the anecdote in her speech as she had heard accounts of survivors being questioned in ways that were “not helpful” and which affected their confidence, “but obviously (lying) was a terrible thing to do”.
6. ‘Politically speaking, it was a bad day in the office for us’
After Ms Khan’s speech in the House on Aug 3, 2021, Singh continued to message Ms Khan on Aug 4 and 5 to comfort her. He also urged her to contact the rape victim cited in her anecdote.
In one of these messages on Aug 4, Singh said: “Please don’t be beguiled by this support, politically speaking it was a bad day in the office for us”.
Ms Khan replied to Singh’s text, saying: “I wonder, Pritam, if I’m not cut out for this.” She followed this up with another text that read: “Perhaps we can meet next week to discuss my future and if this path is meant for me”.
This was because she was feeling “extremely lost” after having made her mistake, said Ms Khan. She was also having a lot of self-doubt over whether being an MP suited her.
Singh texted Ms Khan again on Aug 5 to ask if she had any luck contacting the woman mentioned in her anecdote, and the organisation that had linked Ms Khan up with her.
By this point, Ms Khan said, she was terrified and “kind of just wanted the messages to stop”, so she responded with: “I am still trying and will update you as soon as I can.”
Asked why she did not tell Singh the truth on Aug 5, Ms Khan said she was still grappling with her mistake and the effect it would have on other survivors of sexual assault.
Telling the truth would also have meant telling Singh about her personal experience of sexual assault, which was difficult, she added.
Ms Khan later broke down in court when asked who knew about her personal experience of sexual assault. She said WP’s leaders did not ask her to tell her parents about her experience, and she had not planned to do so.
“I don’t think any parent wants to hear that their child has been assaulted in that kind of way,” she said.
“As a mum myself, it would be so painful to hear from my daughter that something happened to her, so you know, I never intended for (my parents) to learn about the specifics of the assault, which later they did because of what Mr Singh said at the Committee of Privileges without my permission,” she added.
7. Ms Khan had ‘revered’ Singh
As a political newbie in 2020, Ms Khan said she saw Singh as a mentor and someone who could guide her as an MP.
“I revered him. I thought he was someone I really looked up to, someone that I thought really knew everything, someone that would have all the answers,” she told the court.
Asked to recount her time as a first-term MP when she was 26 years old, Ms Khan said she faced a “tricky time” after entering Parliament, as she had felt alone and unsure of herself.
It was Singh who had approached her and told her to run as a candidate in the last general election, which was held on July 10, 2020. She had just started volunteering with the party at the start of that year, while Singh was already WP’s secretary-general.
As a volunteer, she helped in Singh’s Meet-The-People Sessions as a case writer and later with his house visits.
The court also heard that, upon disclosing to the three WP leaders on Aug 8, 2021, that she had lied, Ms Khan was relieved as she had told the people she trusted most in the party to advise her on the matter.
“I felt a huge sense of relief because I didn’t hold that lie in me any more,” she added.
Workers’ Party chief Pritam Singh charged with lying to Parliament over Raeesah Khan’s case, pleads not guilty
2 charges against Pritam Singh for false testimonies to Committee of Privileges
Alleged untruths are in relation to lying controversy involving ex-MP Raeesah Khan
Faisal Manap will not be charged for refusing to answer questions by the Committee of Privileges: SPF, AGC
Leader of the Opposition and Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh was charged on March 19 with two counts of lying to a parliamentary committee, two years after the police opened investigations into his conduct before the Committee of Privileges.
Standing in the dock on March 19, Singh, who was unrepresented, pleaded not guilty to the two charges under Section 31(q) of the Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act, and claimed trial.
The 47-year-old opposition leader requested a four-week adjournment to engage a lawyer. A pre-trial conference has been scheduled for April 17.
Lying in response to questions posed by a parliamentary committee is considered a criminal offence under the Act, and carries a maximum fine of $7,000 and a jail term of up to three years, or both.
In response to media queries, an Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC) spokesman said it is for the court to decide what the appropriate punishment should be if Singh is found guilty.
The spokesman added that the AGC will be asking the court to impose a fine for each of the charges if Singh is convicted. This is based on the “evidence presently available and considering the totality of the circumstances”, the spokesman said.
Political and legal experts told The Straits Times that the WP chief is unlikely to lose his parliamentary seat, even if he is convicted and the total fine for both offences exceeds $10,000 – the threshold upon which an MP faces disqualification from the House. This is as the threshold is for a single offence, rather than a group, to disqualify an individual convicted for offences of a certain magnitude, said law professor Eugene Tan.
In a joint statement, the AGC and police also said the prosecution has decided not to charge Mr Faisal for his refusal to answer relevant questions that had been put to him by the committee. The WP MP was issued an advisory by the police to familiarise himself with conduct expected of MPs under the Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act, and to refrain from any act that may be in breach of it.
Singh arrived at the State Courts at 10.45am, clad in a black suit. When asked for comment after being charged, he said he would be releasing a statement later. He subsequently said he would continue with all his parliamentary duties and town council responsibilities until the legal process “comes to a complete close”.
The committee’s recommendation for Singh to be referred to the public prosecutor came after it investigated Ms Khan for lying in Parliament.
This was later found to be untrue, and Ms Khan eventually told Parliament on Nov 1, 2021, that she had been sexually assaulted herself and had heard about the victim’s experience at a support group session.
In the charge sheets, Singh was said to have given a false answer to the committee’s questions on Dec 10 and 15, 2021.
On one occasion, he had said that after an Aug 8 meeting between him, Ms Khan and WP leaders Sylvia Lim and Faisal, he wanted Ms Khan to clarify that she had lied in Parliament on Aug 3.
On two other occasions, he had said that during a meeting with Ms Khan on Oct 3, he had asked her to come clean about her lie if the issue was brought up in the House on Oct 4.
The eight-member committee comprised seven People’s Action Party MPs and one WP MP. They were then Speaker of Parliament Tan Chuan-Jin, Minister for Sustainability and the Environment Grace Fu, Minister for National Development Desmond Lee, Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Edwin Tong, Senior Minister of State for Manpower and Defence Zaqy Mohamad, Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Health and Law Rahayu Mahzam, Hougang MP and WP organising secretary Dennis Tan, and Chua Chu Kang GRC MP Don Wee.
After a total of 31 hours of hearings held over several weeks, the committee found Ms Khan guilty of abuse of privilege and recommended that she be fined a total of $35,000.
It also recommended that Singh and Mr Faisal be referred to the public prosecutor for further investigations – Singh for not being truthful in his testimony under oath, and Mr Faisal for his “flagrant and inexcusable” refusal to answer relevant questions.
At the crux of the matter was the three months that elapsed before Ms Khan confessed in Parliament on Nov 1, 2021, to lying.
The committee concluded that Singh had played “the key and leading role” in advising her not to come clean after she first lied, and said he had lied when he asserted during the hearings that he had asked her to set the record straight in the House.
Singh has consistently denied the allegations. Though he acknowledged that he had given Ms Khan too much time to clarify the lie, he said he had done so as he was sympathetic to the fact that she had been a victim of sexual assault.
In its 1,180-page report presented to Parliament on Feb 10, 2022, the committee said it was beyond its purview to recommend that any penalty be imposed on Singh and Mr Faisal.
The committee added that while the default position is that Parliament should deal with matters that arise in a parliamentary context, it appeared best in this case that the matter “be dealt with through a trial process, rather than by Parliament alone”, given the seriousness of the two WP leaders’ actions.
In February 2022, after debating the committee’s report, Parliament voted in favour of the committee’s recommendation. The Attorney-General then referred both men to the police for investigation.
Political watchers and observers have been looking out for updates in the case, with some wondering about its implications for Singh’s political future and how it might impact the WP.
The Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act was amended in May 2022 such that an MP will be disqualified if convicted and fined at least $10,000 for an offence.
Parliament votes to refer Workers' Party leaders Pritam Singh, Faisal Manap to Public Prosecutor as recommended by the Committee of Privileges
Singapore's system will fail if trust is eroded and lost: PM Lee Hsien Loong at COP report debate
Honesty of opposition no longer inconsequential in a more contested landscape: PM Lee
Pritam Singh rejects Committee of Privileges' findings, says Raeesah Khan was disenchanted with Workers' Party
Workers' Party leaders did not address key findings from COP during debate: Indranee Rajah
Parliament also agrees with committee's finding that Ms Raeesah Khan be fined $35,000 for lying in Parliament
By Tham Yuen-C, Senior Political Correspondent, The Straits Times, 15 Feb 2022
Parliament on Tuesday (Feb 15) voted to refer Leader of the Opposition and Workers' Party chief Pritam Singh for further probe by the Public Prosecutor over a lying scandal, after a four-hour debate in which Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong urged MPs from both sides of the aisle to vote with their conscience.
PM Lee warned that trust in Parliament and Singapore's political system will be eroded if flagrant, egregious transgressions by MPs were allowed to pass.
Speaking before the vote, Mr Singh said he had no objection to being referred to the Public Prosecutor and would do his utmost to clear his name.
The committee was set up to look into lies told by former MP Raeesah Khan in Parliament on Aug 3 and Oct 4, but had found serious misconduct by Mr Singh, as well as WP chair Sylvia Lim and vice-chair Faisal Manap, in the process of its investigations.
The House voted on two motions, the first of which called on it to agree with the committee's finding that Ms Khan was guilty of abusing parliamentary privilege by lying in Parliament last year, and its recommendation that she be fined $35,000 - $25,000 for the lies she told in August and $10,000 for lying again in October.
Leader of the House Indranee Rajah had proposed to allow MPs to vote on the different parts of this motion separately, after Mr Singh said the WP would not support the part about Ms Khan's reduced $10,000 fine that was premised on her receiving guidance by WP leaders to lie.
The second motion, which was also split, called on Parliament to agree to refer Mr Singh as well as Mr Faisal to the Public Prosecutor. It also seeks to defer any parliamentary sanctions on the duo and Ms Lim with regard to Ms Khan's lie, until the conclusion of any investigations and possible criminal proceedings against Mr Singh.
Both motions were passed, with Mr Singh and the WP MPs supporting part of the first motion, and voting against the second.
Progress Singapore Non-Constituency MPs Leong Mun Wai and Hazel Poa voted in support of all parts of both motions, except for the $10,000 fine for Ms Khan that the WP also voted against.
The matter was referred to the Committee of Privileges, which after hearing evidence from Ms Khan and other witnesses, including the WP leaders, concluded that Ms Khan should be fined $35,000 in all.
The panel also said Mr Singh and Mr Faisal should be referred to the Public Prosecutor for investigations to consider if criminal proceedings ought to be instituted.
The panel had determined that Mr Singh had lied while giving evidence under oath and that this could amount to perjury, and that Mr Faisal's refusal to answer questions could amount to contempt of Parliament.
At the start of the debate, Ms Indranee noted that the ability to speak freely in Parliament is one of the most powerful privileges in a parliamentary democracy such as Singapore, but this must be done responsibly and not abused.
Speaking next, Mr Singh rejected the committee's conclusions that he had guided Ms Khan to lie to Parliament last year, and that he had committed any offences as part of his role in the entire affair.
He acknowledged that he had given her too much time to clarify the lie, and said he had done so because he was sympathetic to how she had been a sexual assault victim.
PM Lee, in his speech, underlined the gravity of the matter before the House, noting that for Singapore's system to work, people must be able to respect the institution of Parliament and trust its members, processes and proceedings.
That is why the right norms of behaviour among MPs have to be guarded carefully, foremost being to tell the truth always and to do right by Singapore, even when - and especially if - it is hard or awkward, he said.
"If something goes wrong, or something wrong has been done, own up and take responsibility - do not hide, dodge, or spin further lies, to obfuscate and cover up the original fib," PM Lee said as he called on all MPs to vote with their conscience on the two motions.
"The COP report is long and detailed, but the core issues are few and stark... Online, people call this Raeesah-Gate, after Watergate. And just like in the original Watergate affair, while investigating Ms Khan's transgressions, the COP unexpectedly stumbled upon a cover-up by WP leaders, even more serious than the original offence," he added.
"Now with the findings before us, it is our responsibility, Parliament's responsibility, for the MPs to take the necessary and appropriate course of action."
Said PM Lee: "If Parliament condones lying among its own members, how can Singaporeans trust the institution of Parliament? If we let flagrant, egregious transgressions pass, it will erode trust in our leaders, respect for Parliament, and support for our whole political system, and Singapore will be heading for trouble."
