TR EMERITUS

MEDIA STATEMENT For immediate use 21 May 2014 Dear Editor, MARUAH is dismayed over the Prime Minister’s first step action of issuing a letter of demand to 'Heart Truths' blogger Mr Roy Ngerng, asking for an apology, a retraction of the blog post and compensation for damages and legal costs to the Prime Minister. We are concerned that these actions on the part of the Prime Minister will further shrink the space for public discourse in Singapore. Robust debates, diverse views, critical inquiries, in addition to a healthy media landscape, are all critical to the development of a functional democracy. A healthy and engaged society calls for diverse, independent voices who will need the space to express their views and face sharp rebuttals if their views are found wanting or even false. These are the first steps to robust critical discourse: being transparent and open. Mr. Roy Ngerng’s articles can be and ought to be refuted by the Prime Minister for any misinformation or lapses in communication. That needs to be done for public good. Criticism of key institutions, including the Office of the Prime Minister, is best addressed through a right of reply by way of well-reasoned rebuttals, not by this reliance on the archaic legal action as a first recourse. If the article in question by Mr Roy Ngerng was incorrect, then the better thing to do is to rebut him in public. Threatening to take legal action against him will not convince the public that he is wrong or that the Prime Minister is right. In fact, sympathy towards Mr Roy Ngerng can even cloud the issue, when what the issue needs is further clarification. The right to freedom of expression is enshrined in our Constitution, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and even in the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration signed by our Government. Yet, our Government’s actions, once again, are highly regressive, and serve to limit the space for expression instead of expanding it. This has also been raised in the 2011 Universal Periodic Review report submitted to the Human Rights Council. In 2004, the Prime Minister, then a Deputy PM, said in a landmark speech to the Harvard Club: “I have no doubt that our society must open up further… Looking ahead, one important task of the government will be to promote further civic participation, and continue to progressively widen the limits of openness. ... We will promote a political culture which responds to people's desire for greater participation, in a manner which supports Singapore's growth as a nation.” We urge the Prime Minister to be open and to engage first in refuting Mr Roy Ngerng’s points of view robustly. This is the way our society needs to function and mature. Ms Braema Mathi President MARUAH Singapore About MARUAH Singapore MARUAH is a human rights NGO based in Singapore. "Maruah" means "dignity" in Malay, Singapore's national language. Human rights is fundamentally about maintaining, restoring and reclaiming one's dignity, and MARUAH strives to achieve this by working on national and regional human rights issues. MARUAH is also the Singapore focal point of the Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, which is officially recognised in the ASEAN Charter as an entity associated with ASEAN. More information on MARUAH at www.maruah.org.  Read More →

Man captured on video Hi TRE, I would like to update TRE readers about a recent video captured by a Facebook user, showing a man in the the act of molesting a woman commuter in MRT train. You can see how the guy is doing it here: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10201979411788311&set=vb.1275838389 He was standing behind the woman with his back facing hers. You can see that he was using one of his hands to caress the woman's buttock behind him. Later, when the guy noticed that he was being videoed, he quickly exited from the train. Meanwhile, the woman was completely unaware that she had been molested. From the look of the guy's face, it's quite clear to me that he is a foreign worker. I would like to know, what is the police going to do about this, now that there is hard evidence capturing the guy who committed this disgusting act? The police should not give any excuse that it's hard to find him from the video when they can quickly round up suspects within days of the Little India Riot, by just going through video evidences. Can I ask TRE to write to the police to inform them about it? Marie Tay Editor's note: The video has more than 2,200 Facebook shares as at 2pm, 21 May. This letter has been forwarded to SPF.  Read More →

The last time Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong responded to a false report was on 13 April this year. And it was not, unlike what you may be thinking, over any articles by a blogger, who seem to meet the sharp edge of Mr Lee’s unhappiness in the form of lawsuits nowadays. Instead, Mr Lee was responding to a wrong report by the government-controlled  mainstream media, in particular the Straits Times. The paper had reported that Mr Lee had said that a “coalition government [in Singapore was] possible in [the] future.” Mr Lee’s alleged remarks were also carried by ChannelNewsAsia (CNA). Two days later, Mr Lee posted a status update on his Facebook page to debunk the reports. “A coalition government was not on my mind,” Mr Lee said, referring to his interview with the Financial Times (FT) from which the Straits Times and CNA seemed to have based their reports. What is interesting is how Mr Lee chose to clear up a false report – by calmly explaining his position and what exactly it was that he said during the interview with the FT. Few would doubt that Mr Lee’s response would be markedly different if the false reports had come from anyone else, especially the alternative and independent online media. And indeed, Mr Lee has once again shown that his preferred response to what he perceives as wrong or untruthful online reports involving him is to send legal letters of demand, as he has done with blogger Roy Ngerng on Monday. Mr Lee took issue with an article which Mr Ngerng had written and published on his blog, The Heart Truths. The article drew comparisons between the case of the leaders of the City Harvest Church, and the Government’s management of Singaporeans’ CPF monies through its investments arms, and the CPF Board. Mr Lee’s lawyers from Drew and Napier claim that the article “means and is understood to mean” that Mr Lee – Prime Minister and Chairman of the GIC – “is guilty of criminal misappropriation of the monies paid by Singaporeans to the CPF.” Mr Lee is demanding Mr Ngerng removed the article, issue an apology and to pay Mr Lee compensation. Mr Ngerng is considering his response to Mr Lee’s letter at the time of writing. This latest incident follows two previous ones where Mr Lee had also similarly issued letters of demand. In 2012, blogger Richard Wan apologised to Mr Lee for an article on his website, TR EMERITUS ; and in 2013, another blogger, Alex Au, also issued an apology to Mr Lee over an article about the sale of a computer system to a PAP-owned company. These cases or incidents have raised once again the question of whether public servants should sue or threaten to sue individuals or citizens over disputed claims. It is thus informative and worth noting how the Prime Minister, whether in his personal or official capacity, has chosen to respond to such reports in the mainstream media which it controls, and the alternative media which it does not. Yet, the reason which the PAP government has always given for preferring lawsuits is that untruths which impugn upon its integrity or honesty must not be left unchecked. “[We] must take accusations of dishonesty against political leaders very seriously,” Mr Lee said in July last year, when the PAP Government was accusing two of the opposition Workers’ Party (WP) MPs of “dishonesty” over the issue of the cleaning of a hawker centre. “Good politics is first and foremost about integrity,” Mr Lee said, adding his voice to the accusation made by minister Vivian Balakrishnan. But here is where the WP’s response to such accusations differ markedly from that of the PAP. The WP has chosen to, basically, let the people decide, and has not directly responded to Mr Lee’s or Dr Balakrishnan’s allegations. To be sure, the WP – and indeed the opposition political parties, and especially the Singapore Democratic Party – has always met with similar accusations from the PAP. And the Straits Times has often been at the forefront of providing front-page publicity for such allegations, as it did in the midst of the by-election in Hougang in 2012: WP faces allegations of dishonesty.” During the PAP’s campaign led by DPM Teo Chee Hean, the WP was once again challenged to take up legal action against the PAP. And again, the WP’s response has been to let the people decide – which they did, with a resounding voice of support, returning the WP candidate victorious with an empathic 62 per cent of the votes. That was, on hindsight, the WP’s main goal – to win the election. It was only after it had secured the victory that its secretary general spoke his mind about the mudslinging by the PAP during the campaign. Mr Low told the media at a post-election press conference: I feel disappointed that what I see in this by-election are situations similar to what I experienced in the 1980s and 1990s, with several calculated moves to discredit the candidate and attack the Workers’ Party. “This by-election is characterised by baseless attacks, distractions, character assassination and real threat of using government resources as carrot and stick to coerce voters from political freedom of choice. It also saddens me to see the role of mainstream media again becoming a political tool of the PAP in their election campaign.” This victory in Hougang followed the equally heated general elections campaign in 2011 where again the WP was accused of dishonesty. “Is it messy or are they holding back till after the elections so that whoever wins Hougang will then inherit the accounts?” the PAP candidate, Lim Hwee Hua, said then, referring to the Hougang Town Council’s financial books. The Hougang Town Council was run by WP secretary general Low Thia Khiang then. Mr Low had been the MP for the single-member constituency since 1991. “The Worker’s Party has always emphasised transparency and accountability of the town council,” Mrs Lim said. At a rally later, Mr Low slammed Mrs Lim for launching a “personal attack to discredit his character and capabilities.” “Do you believe if Hougang’s accounts are messy, I can win Hougang for 20 years?” Mr Low said to the rally crowd. The WP’s Yaw Shiin Leong, the party’s candidate in that election, won 65 per cent of the vote, one of the highest scores overall. And in the 2013 by-election in Punggol East, the PAP seemed to have learnt its lesson and stayed away from such mudslinging. The WP won that election too, with 55 per cent of the vote, a 10 percentage advantage over the PAP’s candidate. In spite of all the accusations, and attempts at smearing the characters and casting doubts on the capabilities of the WP members, the WP has never once chosen to defend their names through legal threats. Instead, they have stood their grounds, continued to diligently do their work, and let the people decide. So, what do all these tell us? Simply put, the PAP’s preference for legal suits to settle debates is from an era of bully-politics, where the hatchet is wielded in place of dialogue, of robust debates, and sincere engagement. It can only come from a party which distrusts citizens and voters, who feel that the best way to win an argument or debate over any issue is to bang the table loudest, and spew forth threats through lawyers wielding letters of demand. Yet, the signs are already there that Singaporeans can and do distinguish between smear campaigns and campaigns fought with integrity, between what is truthful and what is not. How else did the WP win all those electoral battles? Certainly, they couldn’t have won them through being dishonest, or through a lack of integrity? Surely, they did not win them through hoodwinking voters? And this is where our politics must and can move forward, instead of being stuck in the mud of the petty politics of smear campaigns over dirty ceilings, over pasar malam stalls, over upgrading programmes. In short, we Singaporeans should be tired of such politics. We as a people face serious challenges as we move forward – we have an ageing population to consider, a tougher economy to upkeep as we mature, a demography which is fast changing with immigration, our environment is being decimated for cheap shopping malls and condominiums, our heritage is destroyed with impugnity, and our sense of national identity has eroded instead of being cemented, even as we approach 50. These are the very serious issues which we face and which our children will face. And we need to have enough courage and honesty to accept debates on these things and these issues. And in the process of such debates, there will be those whose words are searing, are jarring to our ears, and who will make what we see as inappropriate remarks or comments. But ours is not to silence through lawsuits or legal threats. As the WP has shown, sometimes it is better to trust the people, to stay the hand reaching for the hatchet at the very first instigation, and to convince and win hearts and minds through the integrity of what you do, through debates sincerely engaged. 10 days after his inauguration as Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr Lee said in his first National Day Rally speech: I mean, free expression as long as you don’t get into race and religion and don’t start a riot.  It’s a signal – speak, speak your voice, be heard, take responsibility for your views and opinions.” 10 years later, Mr Lee has launched a letter of demand to three separate bloggers in each of the last three years, and in the process casting a disappointing chill over debates. I regret that the by-election has degenerated to this state and I’m worried because Singapore will regress politically as a society if we move into that direction.” – Low Thia Khiang, May 2012. We Singaporeans need to choose better alternatives, in place of the anachronistic self-serving ways of old. Leaders should be there to inspire its people, and not to silence them. Andrew Loh * Article first appeared in The Online Citizen.  Read More →