Singabloodypore

Lee used to assert that the judiciary must be protected against "unjust attacks and slurs," but in truth, it is he who has not only disfigured the pristine face of justice in Singapore but undermined its very foundation by politicizing it, as well as that of the legal profession. In the ensuing proceedings, counsel for Lee and the Prime Minister, Goh Chok Tong - Drew and Napier and Allen and Gledhill respectively - not to mention the lawyers for the other PAP plaintiffs, disgraced themselves and sullied the noble profession of the law by meekly allowing themselves to be led by their noses by the puppetmeister. In an attempt to win the case at all costs, they not only suppressed important evidence advantageous to Tang but concealed them from the presiding judge, Justice Chao Hick Tin. Nor did they take any steps to correct his [the judge's] misconception of the facts at the subsequent judgmental hearing, consequently ensuring that damages awarded against Tang would be humongous: thus perpetrating a travesty of justice by their studied silence. A classic case of the legal maxim, suppressio veri suggestio falsi - suppression of the truth is suggestion of the false. Given their seniority at the bar, they should have known better. Together with the staff of the Supreme Court registry, they manipulated the practice and procedure of the court and its docket to disadvantage the defendants at every turn in their obscene rush to judgment.

In a closed society where the government has a finger in almost every pie of business and commerce and controls every aspect of community life right down to sporting and even kindergarden activities, it makes sound commercial sense, if nothing else, to keep on its good side for its capacity to distribute lucrative contracts and work to the politically correct. In so far as the legal profession is concerned, the cornucopia of legal work dispensed by the government and its many linked companies was, and is, immense and lucrative. It is bread-and-butter work. It is understandably the aspiration of many law firms to be the chosen receptacle of such official favours. The defamation case or rather cases against Tang Liang Hong and his wife, Teo Siew Har - and the opposition Workers' Party leader, J.B. Jeyaretnam - bring into sharp focus the reluctance of Singapore lawyers to represent clients who are anathema to the puissant Lee and his government. Even so, this is Asian value at its rawest: one does not muddy the source of business or possible businesses by being a contrarian...

With the best will in the world, is it really conceivable for any judge in Singapore to decide a case against Harry Lee Kuan Yew and his PAP cohorts? Neither a wink nor a nod is necessary for a judge who values his position to decide in a certain way. Even if Lee's judicial point man has not intimated the correct decision to his judges, Lee has ensured their loyalty with magnanimous monthly salaries and allowances topping them up with generous yearly bonuses. To paraphrase Vladimir I. Denisov, a Gorbachev-era Soviet parliamentarian: given their princely pay, perks and privileges of office, no Singaporean judge would be mad enough to rule against Lee and his political confrères.

The PAP mouthpiece, the Straits Times, in its news coverage of the visit of Lord Woolf, the Master of the Rolls in England to Singapore, bragged that the visiting English judge was reportedly "especially struck how courts here have built a new legal culture which is highly efficient and technology-orientated. For example, he noted that while court cases here could be heard within six months, quite a few lawsuits in his country were still taking more than two years to be resolved. 'It is very impressive how Singapore courts are so efficient in managing cases and using IT.'" Lord Woolf was speaking, be it noted, on the mechanics of the courts system and not on the quality of justice! One should be able to separate the woods from the trees. The technology may be impressive but it is the administration of justice between people, and justice between individuals and state, and vice versa, that really matters ultimately.

The draconian Internal Security Act (ISA), Cap 143, which allows the arbitrary and indefinite detention of Lee's political opponents, dissidents and media critics, among others, is noticeably being relegated to the back burner, as the courts are increasingly being used to suppress critical comments and viewpoints through threats of defamation actions and the payment of huge damages and ultimately bankruptcy. Singapore has earned the dubious distinction of being a country whose leaders routinely use the libel laws as a weapon of repression. However, the courts cannot be freely resorted to, unless they are first made reliable tools of government: in other words, the judges chosen must be reliable. Tang's legal predicament with its scads of lawsuits, and by extension to that of his defence counsel and political colleague, J.B. Jeyaretnam, proves their political reliability, beyond peradventure.

The news media, in the rankling words of Harry Lee Kuan Yew, must be subordinated to "the overriding needs of Singapore, and to the primacy of purpose of [his] government," a feat he achieved with relative ease but at great cost to his international reputation and stature. The news media was subsequently reshaped into his subservient mouthpiece and that of his PAP government. The legal and judicial system is not too far behind. Once before, Dr. Joseph Goebbells, the Nazi minister of propaganda, dreamt of the same system of justice for the Third Reich where "justice must not become the mistress of the state, but must be the servant of state policy." But where Adolf Hitler and his enthusiastic minister of propaganda failed, Harry Lee Kuan Yew is succeeding. It is not an idle, but a terrifying prospect.
- Francis T. Seow