Bertha Harian

What an unusual Monday! Maybe it’s just the start of another work week for most people but I am guessing that political watchers and political party members were on tenterhooks regarding the court verdict on Pritam Singh’s case. Me included.

District Judge Luke Tan took two hours to build up to his conclusion that Singh was guilty on both charges of lying to Parliament’s Committee of Privileges. (There was even a “technical’’ failure which halted his delivery towards the end before he resumed service.)  

Verdict given, the prosecution made its case for the maximum fine of $7,000 for each charge, making a total of $14,000. That figure would more than disqualify Singh’s position as MP, since the Constitution puts the threshold at $10,000. It was something that many people seized upon despite constitutional experts maintaining that sentences can’t be stacked up in the run-up to the verdict. Depending on political colour, they either cheered it or condemned it. 

Singh made his own case as well, posting on his FB a paper from the archives in which the late Law Minister E W Barker explained why Wee Toon Boon still remained a PAP MP despite four corruption convictions that amounted to 18 months in jail, more than the one year threshold. 

So there seemed to have been a precedent. 

After the sentence was handed down, Singh told the media to wait a little while longer for the Elections Department to give a statement. It seemed that some kind of final pronouncement on his political fate was being prepared.

And so it was. 

The ELD said Singh’s seat in Parliament was still safe and he could contest the next GE. “If a person is charged with multiple offences and the sentence imposed for each of those offences does not reach the disqualification threshold of imprisonment for a term of not less than one year or to a fine of not less than S$10,000, the person is not disqualified from being an MP,” it added.

Now that that’s settled, what’s next? 

Singh has said he will appeal against both conviction and sentence. So we can expect another round of legal wrangling which will hopefully be dealt with in a shorter time than the decade-long saga that engulfed the town council run by the Workers’ Party. The WP was battered and bruised but it came out from under that cloud pretty unscathed and scandal-free. Neither did the long court process affect voters’ sentiments at the polls – at least not enough to have the WP replaced by the PAP. 

What about this case? What will be its impact on voters?

Pro-PAP voices are already crowing about dealing the WP a blow, because the judiciary had dismissed Singh’s entire testimony without any “ifs or buts’’. He now shares the same label as Singapore Democratic Party’s Chee Soon Juan who had also been branded a liar in the past. The difference between the two men is that Singh is a sitting MP who is Leader of the Opposition while Dr Chee has yet to make it through the election gates. 

Doubtless, much will be made about how this was not just a morality case but a question of criminality. Singh broke the law, not just a moral code or had a bad public perception problem.  

Whether this will sink in with voters or even matter to them depends on whether they think Singh and the Workers’ Party got a fair shake in the process. The COP process itself has been criticised, and even more so after it was made public that its chairman at that time had questionable morals that the PAP leaders knew about. The soft touch the COP reserved for Raeesah Khan was also noted, as if the members had got hold of a goose laying golden eggs. 

Khan, then an MP for Sengkang GRC had lied in Parliament on August 3 in 2021 when she recounted an anecdote about accompanying a rape victim to a police station where policemen were dismissive of the victim’s trauma. She told COP that was convened after she confessed to the fabrication that she had qualms about telling the truth because she herself was a former rape victim, something which even her parents didn’t know about. The COP took her at her word. The panel seemed more intent on getting her to tell what role the WP leaders played in a “cover up’’that spanned more than two months than reprimanding her for her lying not once but twice to Parliament. Parliament fined her $35,000.

Justice Tan was also convinced by her testimony to COP when she appeared for Singh’s trial in October last year. Three times, the defence tried to impeach her for varying her statements but the judge found that the discrepancies were “innocent’’ and did not detract from the substance of her testimony. She was also remorseful, regretful and had respected and revered Singh, said the judge. There was no reason for her to turn on her old boss, he added. 

He made it clear that this wasn’t a “he said, she said’’ case over which he had to come down on one side or the other. He had other material to consider, such minutes of meetings, emails and text messages as well as the testimonies of two former WP supporters and, more importantly, that of ex-WP chief Low Thia Khiang, who appeared for the prosecution. The judge believed that the WP decided that Khan should go public after the leaders had consulted their ex-boss, some two months after they first knew of the lie. The WP then set up a disciplinary committee so that Singh could cut himself out of the tangle. 

Is Low squirming about how he was painted in such glowing terms by the judge as a pivotal witness in the case regarding his successor? It would be interesting to know. As for Khan, the judge made some surprising statements about how he was glad that no actual harm had been done to her – which was why he would reject a custodial sentence for Singh. If Singh’s lies had been believed, she would be the one suffering, he added. 

I suppose he is right that Khan would be painted even blacker if she looked as if she had disobeyed orders from her party boss to come clean. Instead of a recalcitrant child, the picture is now that of a confused teenager who needed closer supervision. That might account for WP’s move to hire commercial companies to screen potential candidates for this election. 

This case has been polarising. A high-minded ideal would be that no one should lie, especially under oath. What more an MP? So one lie uncovered has led to another lie being revealed, according to the judge. His analysis was careful but there’s no running away from the political nature of the case which has led to an unprecedented conviction under the Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act. 

Singapore will always have the pro-PAP and pro-Opposition camps who will have their predictable comments and complaints. But it has always been the people in the middle who are the most important as they hold the balance of the votes. If Singh had been disqualified for any reason because of this case, the PAP would have been excoriated – never mind the oaths they swear about having no part to play in it. Now there is an air of relief that so far as electoral politics is concerned, the status quo remains. 

I will stick my neck out to say that what the undecided people want is “choice’’ – and the ability to exercise that at the polls. I am glad that the choice is still there..