TL;DR – PSP’s Leong Mun Wai also admits to not checking his facts before speaking.
In Parliament on 22 March, Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam delivered a ministerial statement on a Facebook post put up by Progress Singapore Party’s Leong Mun Wai on 20 March 2023.
The Minister for Home Affairs and Law said that this was due to some of Leong’s statements being serious misrepresentations and his actions being wrong and contrary to the requirements of Parliamentary procedure.
He noted that on 20 March, he had answered Parliamentary questions on why Lee Hsien Yang and his wife, Lee Suet Fern were named while under investigation.
Why was Lee Hsien Yang & Lee Suet Fern’s names disclosed while investigations are ongoing?
In his speech, Shanmugam said his answer was detailed but later, when Leong was asked which parts of the answer he disagreed with, he did not respond.
Later, in a Facebook post that night, Leong said that the Minister’s characterization of the couple as having “essentially absconded” was inaccurate. Leong also said that by disclosing the investigation into the Lees, Shanmugam and Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean are running the risk of “turning Parliament into a platform to colour public opinion on criminal proceedings”.
Shanmugam said these statements made by Leong were a mixture of misrepresentation and inaccuracy and had to be dealt with.
The Minister asked Leong if he agreed with the main points, that the Court of Three Judges and Disciplinary Tribunal had said that the Lees lied under oath. And indeed if the couple had lied under oath, that was possible criminal conduct. And if there was possible criminal conduct, the couple should then be properly investigated.
Shanmugam also pointed out that Lee Hsien Yang had described himself as a “fugitive” in a Facebook post on 7 March.
Leong Mun Wai withdrew allegations that there were “double standards” when dealing with the Lees’ case
In parliament on 20 March, Leong alleged that there were “double standards” when dealing with the Lees’ case. He drew a comparison by asking why the names of the six former management staff of Keppel Offshore and Marine Limited (KOM) were not publicly disclosed while they were being investigated, while Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Suet Fern’s name were disclosed.
In response to his question, Shanmugam went to great lengths to explain why the names of Lee Hsien Yang and his wife were disclosed while being investigated for giving false evidence in judicial proceedings, when the names of the six former management staff of KOM were not.
After a heated exchange between Shanmugam and Leong, Leong subsequently admits to not checking his facts before speaking and withdrew his allegations, and said that the individuals involved in the KOM case they were not guilty.
Leong also agreed later that the names of the individuals involved in the KOM case need not have to be published.
You may watch the video of the heated exchange below:
@gongsimisg Stay till the end for another plot twist in LMW’s statements 😮💨 #fypsg #sgtiktok #sgparliament #ministershanmugam #leongmunwai #sgpolitics ♬ Funny – Gold-Tiger
Not sure about you, but it was painful to watch the exchange between the two.
It was even harder to watch Leong Mun Wai trying to protect his fellow party member Lee Hsien Yang and his wife, Lee Suet Fern, only to get schooled and whacked by the Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam 😅
