Lee Hsien Yang made a startling assertion in a post he put up on Facebook on 23 July 2023 – he claimed that “[t]rust in the PAP has been shattered”.
That trust, as Mr. Lee observes, was built upon “high standards of propriety and personal conduct, together with staying clean and incorrupt”. He asserts that PM Lee’s “failure of leadership has squandered that trust”.
The reasons for this allegedly arises out of several events and incidents. One of them was, according to Mr. Lee, the rental of 26 and 31 Ridout properties by Ministers K Shanmugam and Vivian Balakrishnan.
The message conveyed by Mr. Lee is obvious. Sandwiched between Mr. Lee’s allusion to “staying clean and incorrupt”, his claim that “[t]hese facts speak volumes” and his conclusion that PM’s “regime does not deserve Singaporeans’ trust” is the reference to the Ridout Properties. Ordinary reasonable readers would have no trouble picking up on Mr. Lee’s insinuations.
The claim that Ministers Shanmugam and Balakrishnan have acted improperly in their rentals of the Ridout Road properties is a serious one. Both Ministers sought the involvement of the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (“CPIB”) and voluntarily subjected themselves to investigation. CPIB conducted independent investigations and cleared the Ministers of any wrongdoing. The matter was extensively debated in Parliament. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Pritam Singh of the Workers’ Party, accepted that no one was making an allegation of corruption against the Ministers. Neither Mr. Leong Wai Mun nor Ms. Hazel Poa, NMPs from the Progress Singapore Party to which Mr. Lee Hsien Yang belongs, claimed otherwise.
Lee was thus given a Correction Direction under POFMA to publish a correction notice and provide access to the correct facts. His response? Doubling down on his position, and denouncing the correction notice as “misleading”.
Ministers Shanmugam and Balakrishnan formed the view that Mr. Lee’s assertions are defamatory. They sent him lawyers’ letters asking him to apologise, withdraw his allegations and pay damages, which they will donate to charity.
Lee did not do as requested. Instead, he made the following claims in another Facebook post:
- He did not assert that Ministers Shanmugam and Balakrishnan were acting corruptly or for personal gain in his 23 July post.
- His post was made in the United Kingdom and the Ministers should sue him there.
Lee’s challenge to the Ministers to sue him in the UK raises interesting legal and non-legal questions. The legal questions need not bother us. It suffices for us to note that Mr. Lee’s current geographical location will not prevent a lawsuit. Lawyers interviewed by the press largely agree. (https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/explainer-sue-someone-overseas-lee-hsien-yang-ridout-road-2221771)
How is the UK factually relevant?
It is the non-legal questions that have escaped attention which we ought to turn our focus to, first of which is this: how is the UK factually relevant?
The answer to the question is simple – Mr. Lee’s 23 July post has no factual relevance to the UK. First, the topics discussed relate to Singapore politics, Singapore politicians and Singapore entities. Second, the intended audience is clearly Singaporeans, who have a vested interest in the matter. Note that Mr. Lee has claimed that PM Lee’s “regime does not deserve Singaporeans’ trust”. He is not inviting British citizens to reevaluate their trust for PM Lee. If Mr. Lee intends to speak to Singaporeans about a matter close to their hearts, he ought to come back here, fight his battles, win his cases, and along with them, the hearts and minds of ordinary Singaporeans.
Why is Mr. Lee in the UK?
Well, if the UK is not factually relevant, why is he challenging the Ministers to sue him there? This is the proverbial elephant in the room, and something that no one has yet directly addressed.
The answer to this is also simple – Mr. Lee and his wife, Mrs. Lee Suet Fern, have both absconded from Singapore. The background to this involved Disciplinary Tribunal hearings conducted by the Law Society with respect to Mrs. Lee Suet Fern. These hearings related to Mrs. Lee’s role in the preparation and execution of Mr. Lee Kuan Yew’s will.
As Minister Shanmugam highlighted in Parliament in March this year, “[b]oth the Disciplinary Tribunal and the Court of Three Judges found that Mr Lee Hsien Yang and Mrs Lee Suet Fern had lied under oath”. This precipitated Police investigations against them, and they were, on 9 June 2022, invited to attend a voluntary interview at the Police Cantonment Complex. This interview was scheduled for 13 July 2023. However, on the appointed day, they sent an email to the Police saying they would not be attending the interview. In fact, they had already left the country by that time.
In subsequent posts made on Facebook and Instagram, Mr. Lee described himself as a “fugitive” and questioned “how can there be fair and proper investigations or a fair trial, in what is clearly a politically-motivated prosecution”.
It is fair to say that he has no intention of ever returning to Singapore. His challenge to the Ministers is thus likely to be a strategic one. That challenge would allow Mr. Lee to maintain that he is not returning to Singapore as a matter of principle, since the case ought to have been started in the UK courts to begin with. And, if the courts here do find him liable in absentia, he could decry the correctness of the decision on the basis that the case was determined without hearing from him.
Whatever the case may be, if Mr. Lee intends to be taken seriously here in Singapore, he would be well-advised to return to Singapore and, at a minimum, address the pending police investigations against him. PSP should also conduct a full review of their relationship with a self-declared “fugitive” and determine if Mr. Lee reflects their ethos and aspirations.