As the Parliamentary hearing on 3 July draws closer and silence from Shanmugam’s good friend and footballing buddy Teo Chee Hian on the farcical fake independent review grows ever more conspicuous, state media are conducting the expected campaign to convince you that there was nothing wrong with two senior Ministers renting enormous state properties on Ridout Road from the agency that one of them was in charge of the agency (Singapore Land Authority or SLA) from which he rented the property. The aim is to convince Singaporeans that the only question is whether “all the correct procedures were followed” as SLA claimed in its statement. If the Government can claim everything was done by the book, by releasing a selective, incomplete and unverifiable version of the process then they hope they can bamboozle the people into ignoring the glaring conflict of interest and egregious breach of the Ministerial Code, not to mention the mismanagement of the reserves to benefit an elite few, that should be staring them in the face. The PAP’s aim will be to sow confusion in the minds of an electorate gaslighted and brainwashed by decades of state misinformation and propaganda into accepting the Government’s perversion of the principles of good governance and believing that the mantra “ownself check ownself” is superior to proper democratic checks and balances. Also the publication this week of winning bids on other tenders for state-owned residential properties in the black and white category is designed to show that Shanmugam and Balakrishnan were not paying rents that were too far out of line with what other properties have achieved, despite the fact that these properties were on less than half the land area of 31 Ridout Road, which is 131,000 square feet or a quarter the size of 26.

The Government propaganda campaign moved into higher gear this week with an article in state media mouthpiece, CNA. The usual talking heads including the veteran Eugene Tan from SMU have been wheeled out to comment on Ridoutgate and what we should expect from the review .Most of these commentators have come from the state media or from a local university and are thus dependent on the Government if they wish to have their contracts renewed. Even PAP-leaning academics who have been mildly critical have been forced to leave Singapore and work overseas, like Cherian George. Ms Nydia Ngow, also cited in the article, was a former senior civil servant in MTi. I of course have not been asked for my comments which reflects the Government’s wish to have my role airbrushed out and normalise the egregious conflict of interest and breach of the Ministerial Code witnessed here. All the commentators call for full disclosure of the relevant facts. Felix Tan, a lecturer at NTU, says that.the Government’s silence on the issue “seems to have called into question whether these ministers were given preferential treatment. It has cast doubts about whether such transactions were above board,”

However most of the commentators welcomed the fake review called by LHL, only grudgingly and after considerable pressure from me, without voicing any disquiet over the fact that it was headed by a senior Minister who cannot have been unaware of Shanmugam and Balakrishnan’s rental of the Ridout Road properties in the first place and couldn’t possibly be independent. None of them called for a COI to be headed by a senior Commonwealth judge (as demanded by me) or even a Singaporean Supreme Court justice as suggested by Harpreet Singh S.C. Whether this is a deliberate and cynical attempt to mislead or just reflects how far the PAP’s decades long indoctrination has gone in convincing even academics who should know better that “ownself check ownself” is the gold standard in governance is not clear.

The most outrageous comment came from someone called Joel Shen, whose LinkedIn profile showed him to be a crypto lawyer and Indonesia specialist, two areas which can’t be said to have a high standard of corporate governance to put it mildly. In fact the only reason he seems to have been included in the article is that his was the most unreserved endorsement of PAP propaganda and a foretaste of how the “independent’ review is likely to go. Shen “said the allegation that Mr Shanmugam has breached ministerial conduct by renting a property overseen by an agency under his ministry is “troubling” Applying that same logic to other ministries would mean that the Minister of Health, for example, should not use public hospitals or the children of an Education Minister should not be allowed to be enrolled in public schools,”

This is a fallacious argument. There is nothing wrong with Shanmugam seeking medical treatment at a government hospital or polyclinic or Balakrishnan sending his children to state schools. However it would be a conflict of interest for Shanmugam, if he was Minister of Health, to get early or preferential treatment for himself or his family or monopolise the time of the best doctors and surgeons at public expense. Ditto to block off a ward for his family’s use. Ridoutgate is akin to the latter and not the former. There was an egregious conflict of interest and what in any democracy would be judged a clear breach of the Ministerial code. Shanmugam was in a position as the ultimate boss of SLA where he had access to inside information about properties. Also since he appointed the head of SLA, it is unlikely that the authority was able to negotiate with him on arm’s length terms. Also Ridoutgate is not like sending your children to public schools. It is like monopolising all the Government scholarships to elite universities for your children despite the fact that the PM has control of the appointment of members of the Public Service Commission who have final say in selecting the scholars, including his son Li Hongyi.

The fact that Shanmugam had privileged information is shown by the fact that he answered Leong Mun Wai’s (LMW) oblique question in Parliament in April 2022 about the rental rates for black and white residences. LMW was clearly given the same information as me about Ridout Road but was either too scared or constrained by his leader to ask a direct question. Instead he phrased it in a general and opaque manner, rather like WP did when, after much prompting from me, they asked a question about the salaries of the top management of GIC and Temasek rather than asking directly what Ho Ching was paid. In my view Shanmugam lied to Parliament by not disclosing that he had a direct interest since he just last year had renewed his lease on 26 Ridout Road on undisclosed terms that were not subject to a public auction process. I see nothing different between what Shanmugam did and what Pritam Singh is accused of in that both failed to disclose material facts to Parliament. In fact Shanmugam’s crime is worse yet he seems to have been given a free pass on this one when he should be referred to the AG, unfortunately another institution over which as Law Minister he exerts influence along with PM Lee.

The stage is being carefully set for Teo Chee Hian to announce in Parliament on Monday that all conditions were scrupulously adhered to and that there was no wrongdoing. The Government will give itself a pat on the back for transparency and Indranee Rajah will stand up to lead an ovation for Shanmugam and Balakrishnan’s honesty and integrity in calling for a review to confirm no wrongdoing was committed. Case closed, let’s move on, nothing to see here. No disclosure of whether other Ministers are occupying state properties. After the Parliamentary Opposition’s token questions have been brushed aside, the WP MPs will sit down, relieved that they haven’t had to do anything to jeopardise their next salary cheque. Singaporeans must not succumb to the gaslighting. We need a properly independent review but the evidence is already fairly overwhelming. The case against Shanmugam is stronger but if, as seems likely, both Ministers breached the Ministerial Code, then they should both be sacked and extra sanctions such as suspension considered. Shanmugam should face additional sanctions for lying to Parliament through evasion when he failed to disclose his interest.

While ordinary people are continually lectured on the need to get full value for state resources and how they must pay the full price for land that they or their forefathers owned or had a claim on in the first place, lest they drain the reserves, we have been treated to the spectacle of a hypocritical Government that has so much money that it can afford to mismanage huge tracts of state land. a mismanagement that has been cynically and secretly exploited by the Minister entrusted with its care to make what appears to be an arbitrage profit between what his private property is valued at and the low valuation put on certain state properties. Ridoutgate clearly demonstrates what the PAP is all about. Privileges and subsidies to benefit an elite few while the vast majority of SIngaporeans are fed a diet of lies and hogwash about the need for austerity, tax rises, and belt tightening lest our reserves run out. If the report by TCH exonerates both Ministers, even partially, then show your anger by voting this rotten Government out at the next election.

Published by kjeyaretnam

I'm a Singaporean economist who became an opposition activist. I blog to provide an alternative to the porkies that the Pinkies tell. It just so happens that my alternative is the truth. That's why I've never been sued in any civil or criminal court no matter how hard hitting my criticism. I'm quoted and interviewed and asked to speak across the world but largely censored in Singapore in an effort to silence my political opinions. The left hate me because they think I split their vote and because I eschew their outmoded economic models. Models that don't work. The Right and the Conservatives hate me because I'm a liberal. I'm not sure what the middle think of me. I don't think there are more than a handful of people in the middle, here in Singapore. I'm a Singaporean born and bred, dual heritage, my parents Singaporean established here before the State of Singapore was created. I'm not Eurasian. I read economics at Cambridge and could be broadly described as from the Keynesian school but I believe in interventions. I was formerly a successful hedge fund manager. After economics and politics my greatest interests are history, film and Makan. I run but I run so I can eat like a Singaporean. View all posts by kjeyaretnam