On Friday, Leader of the House Indranee Rajah tabled a motion for next Tuesday or later in the week, calling on parliament to consider that Singh’s “conviction and conduct render him unsuitable to continue as the Leader of the Opposition” and to express regret at his conduct, which was “dishonourable and unbecoming” of an MP.
This comes after Singh, MP for Aljunied constituency, was convicted on two charges and fined S$14,000 (US$10,879) in February last year for lying under oath to a parliamentary committee looking into a lie former WP MP Raeesah Khan told in parliament in 2021. His conviction was upheld on December 4 after he appealed against it.
“The Leader of the Opposition is not a legal or constitutional office. It was created by parliament and can technically be removed by parliament as well. If parliament passes a resolution to strip Singh of the title, it will be done,” Kevin Tan, a constitutional law expert and adjunct professor at the National University of Singapore, told This Week in Asia.
Benjamin Joshua Ong, assistant professor of law at Singapore Management University, said there was no established precedent on whether the title of Leader of the Opposition could be revoked. “But my instinctive view is that given the weight that the title now carries, any revocation should be done only through a motion which parliament votes to pass.”