Asia Sentinel
Singapore Opposition leader Chee Soon Juan faces jail again for
contempt of court, this time with his sister in tow
As appeared inevitable, Chee Soon Juan, the much-jailed leader
of the embattled Singapore Democratic Party, has been sentenced to
12 more days in jail for having “scandalized the court” and
“obstructed the administration of justice” during a contentious
three-day hearing to decide on damages to be awarded to the ruling
Lee family.
During the cross-examination phase of the hearing, Chee called
former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew a “pitiable figure” and Lee
described Chee as a “near psychopath.” Chee Siok Chin, Chee’s
sister, also a senior SDP member, was sentenced to 10 days in jail
for the same offenses. Both are free while they appeal the
sentence.
Supreme Court Justice Belinda Ang charged Chee Soon Juan with
contempt for accusing the court of being biased and of having
prejudged the hearing, as well as not obeying her orders to stop
particular lines of questioning, according to Agence-France
Press.
Chee, the secretary general of the SDP, and his sister were
found in an earlier hearing to have defamed Lee, now Singapore’s
“minister mentor,” and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in
a 2006 article in their party newspaper, the new Democrat.
Chee has been sent to jail six times already in Singapore, four
for speaking in public without a permit, once for attempting to
leave the country without a permit after being invited to a
conference in Istanbul for the World Movement for Democracy's
Fourth Assembly in April 2006, and once before for “scandalizing
the judiciary.”
He has also been driven into bankruptcy by repeated lawsuits by
government leaders. In 1993, after the SDP leader, a
neuropsychologist, joined the SDP and contested a local election,
his position with the
National University of Singapore was terminated, allegedly for
misappropriation of research funds. Chee later staged a
hunger strike, saying the charges were fabricated. He didn’t
get his position back.
Last week, in an unusual step for a Singapore court, Chee was
allowed by the court to cross-examine both the elder Lee and his
son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. However, the cross examination
by Chee and his lawyer turned into a free-for-all, with Ang
repeatedly ruling Chee’s questions out of order or irrelevant. Chee
continued to assert his innocence on all charges, telling the court
that “At no point was there a deliberate attempt to do anything
that would scandalise the court." According to local media, he
added that "There were many political arguments made and in the
heat of the battle, Mr. Lee said some things and I said some
things. It was in this context that some things were said and
done."
The state prosecutor had asked Ang to deliver a “substantial
fine” to act as a deterrent for other “like-minded”
individuals.
Chee Soon Joon and Yap Keng Ho, another party official, are also
free on appeal after having been sentenced to five weeks in prison
or to pay a S$5,000 (US$3,671) fine last Wednesday in the court of
District Court Judge Jasvender Kaur. The two were sentenced for
speaking in public without a permit during elections in April 2006.
Chee pleaded not guilty, claiming he had a constitutional right to
free speech.
In more trouble for the SDP, Gopalan Nair, a former Singaporean
who ran as an SDP candidate in the 1988 and 1991 general elections
before moving to the United States to become a US citizen, dared
the Singapore police to arrest him for illegal blogging after Lee
Kuan Yew said in court that he would take action against any
blogger for making defamatory remarks. Police took him up on his
dare, collecting him from his
hotel room and taking him to jail after he wrote on his blog
that “I am present in Singapore at Broadway Hotel, Room 708, 195
Serangoon Road, Singapore, 218067. The hotel telephone number is
62924661. My local SingTel telephone number is 83764236.”
He soon got his wish. According to an SDP news release, police
descended on the hotel room and arrested Nair on Saturday night at
about 9 pm. Nair has been a vocal critic of the PAP Government,
bombarding the news media with blogs charging the Lee family with
abusing the legal system for their own ends and of being
insensitive to the plight of ordinary Singaporeans. He often
returns from California to take up the political cudgels, and,
according to the SDP, “has expressed a desire to be closer to home
to effect political changes.”
Authorities require a police permit if more than five people
seek to assemble outdoors in Singapore. Offences under the Public
Entertainments and Meetings Act could lead to fines as high as
S$10,000. Singapore has been under widespread criticism by press
groups and human rights organizations for decades for what they
term political repression and restrictions against free speech. The
Lee family have repeatedly sued both local politicians and the
international press for defamation on a wide variety of fronts, and
so far have never lost a case in Singapore.
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