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SINGAPORE — After he found out that former Sengkang GRC MP Raeesah Khan had lied in Parliament, Workers’ Party (WP) chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh told a parliamentary committee investigating the matter that he had asked her to clarify the untruth to the House.
In reality, Singh had on two different occasions told Ms Khan to maintain her lie, said the prosecution on Oct 14, the first day of Singh’s trial.
This meant that in attempting to downplay his own responsibility in Ms Khan’s lying controversy, he had provided false testimony to the Committee of Privileges, it added.
Ms Khan had admitted in Parliament on Nov 1, 2021 that she misled Parliament on Aug 3, 2021 and Oct 4, 2021 when she claimed and then restated that she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station.
The former Sengkang GRC MP first disclosed her lie to Singh on Aug 7, 2021. The committee that investigated Ms Khan’s lie held hearings for seven days between Dec 2 and Dec 22, 2021, and its report was debated in Parliament on Feb 15, 2022, which was when the House resolved to refer Singh to the Public Prosecutor for a further probe. Singh was charged on March 19, 2024.
In his opening statement, Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock said Singh, 48, had lied to the committee about what he wanted Ms Khan to do about her Aug 3, 2021 untruth in Parliament when he discussed the matter with her on Aug 8 and Oct 3 that year.
The prosecution will call former WP chief Low Thia Khiang and Ms Khan, among others, as witnesses for the case, he added.
The DAG said that in contrast to what he told the committee, Singh had at the Aug 8 meeting been prepared for Ms Khan and the WP leaders to “take (the matter) to the grave”.
“It was clear to Ms Khan then that her party leaders did not want her to clarify the untruth and that she could leave the matter be,” he said.
When they met again on Oct 3, Singh did not tell Ms Khan she should clarify the matter if it came up in Parliament the next day, said the DAG. Contrary to what he told the committee, Singh gave Ms Khan the impression that she could choose to continue with her narrative and that he would nor judge her if she did so.
Singh, a trained lawyer and experienced politician, had “even on his account to the Committee of Privileges” told Ms Khan that he would not judge her, the DAG stressed. “I think that is self-explanatory,” he said.
“We will show that the inexorable conclusion to be drawn is that the accused had guided Ms Khan on Oct 3, 2021 to maintain the untruth if the matter was raised in Parliament on Oct 4, 2021,” he added.
When Singh, WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim and Ms Khan met in the evening of Oct 4 after that day’s Parliament sitting, neither WP leader told Ms Khan to clarify the untruth. Instead, it is the prosecution’s case that Singh had told Ms Khan that it was “too late” to do so.
The trial, which is fixed for 16 days until Nov 13, is being heard before Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan at the State Court. Before trial proceedings began proper, Singh’s charges were read to him again, and the WP chief reiterated his earlier not guilty plea before a courtroom with almost 40 people in the gallery.
As the opening statement was being delivered, Singh was sitting a row behind his lawyers, with his father Amarjit Singh, a former district judge, seated beside him. Notable figures in the gallery include WP MPs Faisal Manap, Gerald Giam, Jamus Lim and Louis Chua, and social media influencer Wendy Cheng, better known as Xiaxue.
The DAG said “there was simply no way” that Singh intended for Ms Khan’s lies to be clarified when Parliament sat on Oct 4, 2021, as the accused had claimed.
This is as no preparatory steps were taken then, compared to after an Oct 11, 2021, meeting that involved Mr Low Thia Khiang.