SINGAPORE: After making a friend at a drinking hole in Jalan Besar, a man agreed to a proposed business to open a pub in Tai Seng.
However, this “business” later became the front of an illicit money-making scheme – to “hire” foreign women as performing artistes by getting them work permits, but later allowing them to moonlight and charging them monthly fees.
Singaporean Thum Yieong Tong, 62, also roped his ex-wife into a separate scheme, getting her to act as director for a karaoke business called Funstarter.
For contravening manpower laws and abusing the work permit scheme, Thum was sentenced to 12 months’ jail on Thursday (Aug 22).
He was also ordered to pay a penalty of S$24,050 (US$18,400), the amount of profit he made personally across the charges, but said he could not pay this sum and instead would serve another seven weeks’ jail in default.
Thum pleaded guilty to two counts under the Employment of Foreign Manpower Act (EFMA) of obtaining work passes for foreigners for non-existing businesses or businesses that did not employ them, with another two charges taken into consideration.
BIRTH OF THE SCHEME
In early December 2017, Thum met 52-year-old Singaporean Yeo Tiong Lam while drinking alcohol along Jalan Besar and the pair later became drinking buddies.
Yeo suggested to Thum to purchase a pub at Tai Seng, and brought him to visit the premises.
Thum was interested in the proposal and called his friend of 20 years, 55-year-old Singaporean Ronnie Toh Swee Heng, to ask if he wanted to join in.
Toh later settled on being the director in name for the company they set up, called TSP Entertainment, but left operations to Thum and Yeo.
After Toh agreed to be the company’s director, Yeo privately told Thum that they could make work permit applications for foreigners to enter and remain in Singapore as performing artistes.
They would then let the foreigners seek their own employment, but profit by collecting monthly payments from them.
Yeo said he would give Thum the foreigners’ details, and all Thum had to do was make applications using the Ministry of Manpower’s (MOM’s) Work Pass Online Portal, take the foreigners for medical checkups and help process their work permit cards.
Yeo said Thum would earn S$130 for each work permit application he made. On top of this, the foreigners would pay Thum a sum of S$1,800 monthly, which would be used to pay for rental of the pub’s premises, and the remainder would be split equally between Yeo and Thum.
Thum agreed. Both of the men knew that TSP would not hire the foreigners. Initially, Thum used Toh’s Singpass details to log in to MOM’s portal to make work permit applications and would ask Toh for the one-time passwords (OTPs) required.
Toh later passed his SIM card to Thum to save himself the trouble of transmitting the OTP to Thum.
Between March 2018 and December 2018, Thum applied for work passes for 15 foreigners – who appear to be Thai or Vietnamese women based on their names in court papers.
He was paid S$130 for each application he made for the 15 women, receiving a total of S$1,950.
He was also paid S$1,800 each month by the foreigners through their agents for the work permits, a total of S$66,600.
He was to use this money to make rental payments for TSP’s premises – a total of S$51,600 for 12 months at S$4,300 per month, but defaulted on about S$10,000 in rent.
In total, he made a profit of S$14,450 from obtaining work permits for the foreigners at TSP.
THE KARAOKE BUSINESS
Thum also got his ex-wife, Tan Beng Yan, to act as director for a karaoke business called Funstarter he wanted to set up.
He claimed he had run into issues using his own name in registering the business, and Tan agreed to act as director for the company.
Between September 2017 and July 2018, Thum obtained work passes for six foreign women to “work” at Funstarter as performers.
He used his ex-wife’s Singpass details to make the applications on MOM’s portal, asking her for the OTPs.
For every application Thum made, he was paid S$1,600 by the foreign women through their foreign agents. In total, he earned S$9,600 for the six foreigners.
Their agents then helped secure jobs for the women so they could sustain themselves in Singapore.
BUSTED
The crimes were uncovered after the police conducted inspections at a club known as “Mao at Barcode” at Oriental Plaza in September 2018 and June 2019.
The officers found foreigners at the club who held work passes for their employment as performing artistes at Funstarter and TSP.
Investigations revealed the two schemes Thum was embroiled in. At the time, each of the companies allowed Thum a quota to employ eight foreigners as performing artistes for up to six months at a time.
The prosecution sought 11 to 12 months’ jail for Thum and a penalty of S$24,050 to disgorge the total profit he made. Yeo had earlier been sentenced to 39 months’ jail.
The MOM prosecutors cited the scale of operations, which corresponds to the adverse impact of the offences and “social ills” caused, and the difficulty in detection.
They cited an earlier court case which highlighted that a case would be more egregious if it involved the creation of shell companies, abandonment of workers and receiving kickbacks from the workers.
Thum had obtained a total of 21 work passes and played a significant role in the scheme, personally applying for the permits and taking the workers for medical checkups or to MOM to collect their work permits.
Thum was unrepresented. He submitted a written mitigation plea to the judge, which was not read out in open court, and said he had nothing more to add.
However, he said he could not pay the penalty as he was now a salaried worker earning S$2,000 to S$3,000 a month.
He asked to defer his sentence to September to settle matters relating to his job and car, and was granted his request.