13 January 2025
(1) INTRODUCTION
1. Raeesah Begum Bte Farid Khan (“Raeesah Khan”, “Ms Khan” or “PW1”) lies. She lied in Parliament on two occasions. She lied to her friends Ms Loh Pei Ying (“PW2”) and Mr Yudhishthra Nathan (“PW3”). She lied about the lie told in Parliament to the Secretary General of the Workers’ Party, Mr Pritam Singh (“Mr Singh”). These are facts.
2. Raeesah Khan lies when she is spoken to directly. She lied to PW3 following his questions raised about her speech in Parliament by Minister of State (“MOS”) Desmond Tan on 3 August 2021. She lied directly to Mr. Singh when he questioned her about it. These are facts.
3. Raeesah Khan lies in text messages. She lied to both PW2 and PW3 about the truth of her anecdote. She lied for days on end in messages to Mr. Singh about the truth of her anecdote. These are facts.
4. We don’t need to determine whether Raeesah Khan lies because that has already been conclusively established. Not only has she admitted to lying, but we also had a national spectacle in the form of the Committee of Privileges (“COP”) to establish the fact that she lies.
5. But in a curious turn of event, it is not Raeesah Khan that is in the dock for lying, but Mr Singh. Of the four individuals, Raeesah Khan, PW2, PW3 and Mr. Singh, brought before the police investigation in respect of Ms Khan’s lie told in Parliament, only Mr. Singh is charged with an offence. Raeesah Khan, who lies continuously and indiscriminately, is not charged with any offence. PW2 and PW3, both of whom, at the very least, conspired to hide from Parliament evidence of how they persuaded Ms Khan to continue lying in Parliament, which was made clear to the police during their investigations, are not charged with any offence.
6. It is Mr Singh that is charged with the offences. The same Mr. Singh, who from the moment he had sight of the anecdote that Ms Khan intended to deliver in Parliament on 3 August, called on her to substantiate the anecdote; the same Mr Singh who, even after the sitting of Parliament on 3 August had ended, and in the days that followed, pressed Ms Khan to provide the necessary details to substantiate her anecdote. The same Mr Singh who, after Ms Khan recovered from shingles in September, and before the next sitting of Parliament on 4 October, sent an email impressing the importance of being able to back up and defend what an MP says in Parliament; and the same Mr. Singh who, on 3 October, went to Ms Khan’s house to warn her that the government may bring up the issue again. Throughout all this Mr Singh has been consistently clear in his position. Initially, he was prepared to give her time to speak to her parents and collect herself before admitting the fact that she lied to Parliament, but he was not prepared to let that go on indefinitely. It was Mr Singh who emphatically rejected the pleas from Ms Khan’s friends, PW2 and PW3, to cover up the lie with another one. He has never hidden the fact that it was Ms Khan’s duty to take responsibility and ownership of the issue, and that it was her decision to continue to lie, a fact that he made clear to Ms Khan, and from which she did not demur. He did not seek to control how she responded to questions following her admission to Parliament that she lied because he had nothing to hide. He did not get together with Ms Khan, PW2 and PW3, before the COP in any attempt to align his account, because there was nothing to align. He did not give in to threats before the hearing from PW2 because there was nothing that could threaten him. Rather, his advice to anyone who asked was to tell the truth. And he did not seek to delete his messages to the COP because there was nothing for him to hide about his conduct. Yet, it is Mr. Singh, who has maintained the account he gave in the COP surrounding Ms Khan’s lie, that is charged.
7. The charges against Mr Singh are as follows:
a. 1st Charge (MCN-900426-2024) – that as at the conclusion of his meeting with Ms Khan, Lim Swee Lian Sylvia and Muhamad Faisal bin Abdul Manap on 8 August 2021, Mr Singh wanted Ms Khan to, at some point, clarify in Parliament that what she told Parliament on 3 August 2021 about having accompanied a rape victim to a police station was untrue.
b. 2nd Charge (MCN-900427-2024) – that when Mr, Singh spoke to Ms Khan on 3 October 2021, he wanted to convey to Ms Khan that she had to clarify that what she told Parliament on 3 August 2021 about having accompanied a rape victim to a police station was untrue if this issue came up in Parliament on 4 October 2021.
8. As this trial has established, the charges are based, not on answers to questions that he actually gave, but the purported “thrust” of what he said.
9. To add further insult to injury, the Prosecution’s case is essentially that the word of a proven liar and her two friends desperate to cover up their own role should be believed over that of Mr. Singh. If there is one thing that this trial has demonstrated, the “truth” seems to escape these three individuals, Ms Khan, PW2 and PW3, each time they take an oath to tell it. Worse still, this trial has revealed the lies they told to the COP and to this Court, the conspiracies they hatched behind closed doors, and the extent they would go to ensure that the truth never sees the light of day.
10. As the court sits to weigh the evidence in this matter the question that must sit heavy on its shoulders is this: is it really possible to believe, beyond all reasonable doubt, the words of proven, self confessed liars over those of Mr Singh? Whether or not Mr Singh could, with the benefit of hindsight, done or said something else to make his position clear is neither here nor there. The crux of the matter is this: can the court take the word of liars – including those that have seen fit to lie before this court in the course of these proceedings – as proof that Mr Singh lied? The answer must be a resounding no.
Office of the Leader of the Opposition 