| Daily Update of the Pritam Singh Trial – October 21, 2024 |
17:12
Judge to review message logs alongside evidence from Yudhishthra Nathan
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan says that while the messages in question were sent after Oct 4, 2021, they might relate to the testimonies of Mr Yudishthra Nathan and Ms Loh Pei Ying about their meeting with Pritam Singh on Oct 12, 2021.
Mr Nathan and Ms Loh had testified in court that it was during this meeting that Singh told them he met Ms Raeesah Khan on Oct 3, 2021, and he told Ms Khan he would not judge her, regardless of whether she maintained her lie or clarified it.
“So the issue of their credibility, especially leading up to the 12th, and even on the 12th, is an issue. Because it goes to whether their evidence is to be believed or not,” says Judge Tan.
Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock says “differences between them on the 12th are actually very narrow”, but adds that he will deal with this at the appropriate time.
He adds that the prosecution will present one set of unredacted messages from Mr Nathan from Oct 4 to Oct 12, as well as a set with redactions that was submitted to the Committee of Privileges, and the reasons for the redaction.
The judge says he will need to review the documents alongside Mr Nathan’s evidence, before making a decision on the matter.
The hearing has ended for the day and will resume at 11am tomorrow.
16:52
Defence asks for redacted and unredacted versions of Yudhishthra Nathan’s COP evidence
Mr Andre Jumabhoy says the defence is seeking the unredacted version of Mr Yudhishthra Nathan’s evidence to the Committee of Privileges (COP), as well as the same set of documents, but with the redactions and the reasons given for them.
This is a reasonable line of inquiry as it goes directly to whether Mr Nathan’s and Ms Loh Pei Ying’s testimonies are credible, says Mr Jumabhoy. “I’m not here to challenge the findings of the COP… (but) these witnesses’ credibility is very much an issue,” he adds.
The prosecution says Mr Jumabhoy is seeking to show that the witnesses had hid evidence before the COP, and to get the judge to rule on the COP’s proceedings.
Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock says: “The defence is inviting Your Honour to go into the integrity of the COP process. What will they do with (that)? They will use it for whatever purposes they want.
“That is the only finding that can come out of this exercise.”
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan says during this exchange that he will not make any findings about the COP’s proceedings because that is not relevant to this trial.
16:16
Low Thia Khiang leaves State Courts amid back-and-forth between prosecution and defence
Former Workers’ Party chief Low Thia Khiang has left the State Courts, nearly three hours after arriving. This is a clear sign that the court is not yet ready to move on from Mr Yudhishthra Nathan’s testimony to Mr Low taking the stand.
The prosecution and defence are arguing before the judge whether redacted messages should be produced as evidence in court.
16:11
Defence applies to court for a copy of Yudhishthra Nathan’s redacted messages
Mr Andre Jumabhoy is applying to the court for a copy of Mr Yudhishthra Nathan’s redacted messages, and Mr Nathan is asked to step out of the courtroom.
He argues that Mr Nathan and Ms Loh Pei Ying had put forth a narrative that they were operating under party leaders’ instructions, when they, as Ms Raeesah Khan’s friends and confidants, were the ones who had told her to lie.
Mr Jumabhoy also asserts that Mr Nathan’s redacted message clearly relates to the case, given that the two former Workers’ Party cadres had disregarded clear orders not to discuss their evidence, and instead had aligned their evidence.
“We don’t know what’s under these redactions and what they might say,” he adds.
Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock objects, saying that these redactions are not relevant to the case at hand.
DAG Ang points out that while the defence is trying to prove that the Committee of Privileges (COP) was deprived of some material finding, the prosecution believes the COP’s findings are not relevant to the trial.
The prosecutor notes that the first charge that Pritam Singh faces has to do with what happened on Aug 8, 2021, while the second charge has to do with what happened on Oct 3, 2021.
The redacted messages were all from after this time.
“Nothing in those messages that have been redacted go to any of those truths,” says DAG Ang.
15:50
Former WP cadres breached explicit instructions not to discuss their evidence to COP hearing
Mr Andre Jumabhoy asks Mr Yudhishthra Nathan if he remembers whether he had a conversation with Ms Loh Pei Ying about which messages they should redact in their evidence to the Committee of Privileges.
Mr Nathan replies that he spoke with Ms Loh about the general redaction process, and told her that he thought “private views expressed to Ms Khan after Oct 4 were immaterial”.
Mr Jumabhoy then asks if Mr Nathan was aware that Ms Loh was told not to discuss her evidence with anyone, and that he had likewise been explicitly warned on this.
“And you leave Parliament and you do exactly that?” he asks.
Mr Nathan says yes.
Mr Jumabhoy then asks if this was in breach of what he had been told not to do, effectively ignoring Parliament’s instructions.
“At that point of time, yes,” Mr Nathan says.
15:47
Defence tells Yudhishthra Nathan that he deliberately took out messages as it ‘makes (him) look bad’
Mr Andre Jumabhoy continues questioning Mr Yudhishthra Nathan about the Oct 12, 2021, message he redacted from his message log submitted to the Committee of Privileges (COP).
In Mr Nathan’s earlier testimony, during the examination-in-chief, he had said he felt the message was “immaterial” and that it was his view that the COP was interested in “things such as party leaders”.
But the defence counsel says the message in question was not irrelevant to the investigations, pointing out that the committee had cited examples of such messages, such as “irrelevant discussions with friends and non-interested parties”.
Still on the redaction, Mr Jumabhoy also points out that the COP had said it needed to see “the trail” of messages.
“You can’t just cherry-pick the messages, they want to see the whole trail,” Mr Jumabhoy tells Mr Nathan.
Mr Jumabhoy also suggests that Mr Nathan had been some kind of adviser to Ms Raeesah Khan, a characterisation the former Workers’ Party member disagreed with.
“Do you not think that the COP would be interested that (Ms Khan’s) confidant, the man behind the scenes, was telling her to continue to lie?” Mr Jumabhoy asks.
In the exchange, Mr Nathan reiterates that he felt the message was “immaterial” as he had sent it on Oct 12, 2021, after the two instances of Ms Khan lying in Parliament on Aug 3, 2021, and Oct 4, 2021. It was this period that the COP was looking at, he adds.
“If it was a completely irrelevant message, you won’t waste your time and effort to redact it, you would have overlooked it,” says Mr Jumabhoy.
“I disagree with that,” Mr Nathan responds.
15:10
Yudhishthra Nathan maintains that redacted message was ‘immaterial’ to COP hearing
When the hearing resumed after lunch, defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy honed in on Mr Yudhishthra Nathan’s message to Ms Raeesah Khan on Oct 12, 2021, to “not give too many details (and) at most apologise for the fact of not having her age accurate”.
This was a reply to Ms Khan, who had told Mr Nathan and Ms Loh Pei Ying that if she went down the route that Pritam Singh and Ms Sylvia Lim decided, which was to come clean about her untruth to Parliament, she would have to go public about her sexual assault.
Mr Nathan had redacted this message in the evidence he submitted to the Committee of Privileges (COP) in December 2021.
Under cross-examination, Mr Nathan agrees with Mr Jumabhoy that his reply to Ms Khan was advice that she continue to lie.
Mr Jumabhoy points out that the COP was set up to establish the facts around Ms Khan’s lie, and the redacted message was about how to handle the lie. Mr Nathan agrees with both statements.
The defence lawyer then says that Mr Nathan, therefore, has no basis to redact the message, as he knew that it was not immaterial to the COP’s proceedings.
Mr Nathan disagrees. “Given the specific context of the message when I sent it, yes, I did think that was immaterial at that time,” he says.
Mr Jumabhoy says: “The reality of why you redacted this message is that it shows you in a bad light, isn’t it?”
Mr Nathan says he “partially agrees”.
“I think if people understood my state of mind when I had sent that message then… they might have come to a different conclusion,” he adds.
13:14
Ex-secretary-general of WP arrives at court
Former Workers’ Party (WP) chief Low Thia Khiang has arrived at the State Courts.
The veteran politician, who was WP chief from 2001 to 2018, will be testifying as a prosecution witness in his successor Pritam Singh’s trial.
On Oct 11, 2021, Mr Low met Singh and WP chairwoman Sylvia Lim, where he was informed of Ms Raeesah Khan’s lie to Parliament.
The prosecution had said at the start of the trial that it would lead evidence that Mr Low had, at that meeting, advised Singh and Ms Lim that Ms Khan should clarify her untruth in Parliament as soon as possible, and to apologise.
The prosecution’s case is that up till Oct 11, 2021, none of the WP’s leaders had instructed Ms Khan to clarify her untruth to the police or in Parliament.
12:52
Yudhishthra Nathan says he can’t remember proposing to Pritam Singh that Raeesah Khan should maintain her lie during Oct 12 meeting
The defence questions Mr Yudhishthra Nathan about his meeting with Pritam Singh and Ms Loh Pei Ying on Oct 12, 2021, after Mr Nathan says he “cannot recall” what he told Singh.
In particular, defence counsel Andre Jumabhoy asks Mr Nathan if he had suggested to Singh that Ms Khan should not reveal too many details about her anecdote and should just clarify the alleged sexual assault victim’s age.
Mr Nathan says he was “pretty sure” that he did not suggest to Singh that Ms Khan should maintain her lie.
To this, Mr Jumabhoy says that Ms Loh had a different recollection of this, and had told the court that Mr Nathan did make this suggestion at their meeting.
Mr Jumabhoy points out that Mr Nathan has misspoken on two occasions, and asks him what prompted his turnaround.
After a long pause, Mr Nathan says: “I’d like to apologise to the court. Having reflected, I can’t recall because we spoke about many things that… I don’t recall having put this suggestion to Mr Singh.”
Mr Jumabhoy replies: “This feels like Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Is that your final answer?” Scattered laughter is heard in the courtroom.
The defence counsel grills Mr Nathan on the possibility that Singh had responded to the suggestion to only mention the victim’s age by saying, “don’t even think about covering this up with another lie”.
Mr Nathan says he cannot recall that, but accepts it is possible. He adds that he only recalls asking Singh why the party was changing direction.
Mr Jumabhoy says someone at the meeting must have suggested that Ms Khan continue with her lie, given that Mr Nathan had accepted it is possible that Mr Singh had rejected the suggestion. Mr Nathan says he cannot recall.
Mr Jumabhoy presses: “So did you or didn’t you?”
Mr Nathan replies: “I don’t think I did, no.”
The court breaks for lunch.
12:40
Yudhishthra Nathan’s position before Oct 12 meeting was for Raeesah to ‘actively maintain the lie’ as party had no proper plan
Before a meeting with Pritam Singh and Workers’ Party chairwoman Sylvia Lim on Oct 12, 2021, Mr Yudhishthra Nathan was concerned that the party leaders had not come up with a proper plan for Ms Raeesah Khan to come clean about her lie.
This came up as Mr Nathan answered questions about his WhatsApp message suggesting that Ms Khan should not give too many details about her anecdote and should just clarify the age of the alleged sexual assault victim.
Mr Andre Jumbhaboy presses Mr Nathan about whether it was his position that Ms Khan should lie some more in the absence of a proper plan.
After some back and forth, Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock interjects to say that the question is unclear.
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan asks if by “lie some more”, Mr Jumabhoy meant to actively go out and tell some more lies, or withhold the truth. The defence lawyer responds to say he meant to actively go out and tell more lies.
Mr Nathan says that his position at the point was to actively maintain the lie. The judge asks what he meant by actively maintaining the lie and what he would envisage her doing.
“‘Active’ in the sense that she may go and clarify the age, but not come out and say she had lied about going to the police station,” Mr Nathan replies.
He adds that he is not certain if he said this in relation to what Ms Khan should say in Parliament, or what she should tell the police.
By then, Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam had said in Parliament that the police would be looking into the anecdote.
Asked by Mr Jumabhoy if he was aware of this, Mr Nathan says: “Yes, but I was under the impression that (the) party leaders (were) also not putting pressure on her to attend police investigations, but I could be wrong about that.”
12:15
Yudhishthra Nathan says he vacillated on whether Raeesah Khan should come clean before the night of Oct 12, 2021. Defence says no evidence of this
Mr Yudhishthra Nathan says that before his and Ms Loh Pei Ying’s Oct 12 meeting with Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh, he had “vacillated” on whether Ms Raeesah Khan should come clean about her lie.
The defence, however, notes that Mr Nathan had disagreed with a suggestion Ms Loh had made that Ms Khan come clean to the WP’s central executive committee (CEC), as he felt it would be too risky, and he was doubtful they would be able to help Ms Khan.
Singh’s lawyer, Mr Andre Jumabhoy, also points to a message from Mr Nathan to Ms Khan that the lawyer asserts was advice for her to ignore a request from the police’s Serious Sexual Crime Branch seeking to interview her for their investigations.
Mr Nathan says he can’t recall if this was about the police investigation, as there were some redacted messages in their conversation.
Mr Jumabhoy says: “Insofar as (from Oct) 4 to 7, there was nothing in your messages that suggested that she should come clean.”
Mr Nathan replies: “I wouldn’t say explicitly.”
The lawyer then asks: “If it’s not explicit, where is it implicitly?”
Mr Nathan replies that he was expressing his doubts about Ms Khan coming clean to WP’s CEC, to which Mr Jumabhoy counters that there was nothing implicit about that, being a counter view to Ms Loh’s suggestion.
Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan interjects to ask Mr Nathan if, at that point, there was someone else he had in mind for Ms Khan to come clean to.
Mr Nathan replies: “Not in particular, I didn’t have anyone else in mind at that point in time. It was just a response to Ms Loh’s suggestion.”
11:14
‘There are more deleted messages than messages in which we can see the contents’: Defence
Pointing to Mr Yudhishthra Nathan’s evidence to the Committee of Privileges (COP), Mr Andre Jumabhoy notes that Mr Nathan had told the committee that he did not recall speaking to Ms Raeesah Khan on Oct 4, 2021. That was the day when Ms Khan doubled down on her lie in Parliament.
Mr Nathan replies: “You missed out the part where I said it’s possible I might have (done so) but I’ve forgotten it.”
Mr Jumabhoy then continues: “You said, ‘I spoke with her, from my recollections, either (on) Oct 12 or just before’.”
Mr Nathan agrees.
Mr Jumabhoy refers to message logs between Mr Nathan and Ms Khan, and points to numerous messages that Mr Nathan had deleted.
“As far as this chat is concerned, there are more deleted messages than messages in which we can see the contents. Do you agree?” he asks.
Mr Nathan responds: “Generally, yes.”
Mr Jumabhoy says it is “pretty clear” that on Oct 4, Mr Nathan had very much been in discussions with Ms Khan. Mr Nathan agrees.
Mr Jumabhoy then questions him on why, despite this being “quite a seminal event in relation to what’s going on”, Mr Nathan did not remember this when he gave evidence to the COP.
He replies that “many things had happened” by the time he found himself before the COP.
Mr Jumabhoy suggests that Mr Nathan had not told the COP what he did because admitting to the committee that him and Ms Loh had those messages in their group chat did not look good, and was not something he was prepared to do.
“I disagree with that,” Mr Nathan says.
10:59
Defence grills Yudhishthra Nathan on claim that Pritam said conservative religious men wouldn’t like to have MP who was sexually assaulted
Mr Andre Jumabhoy asks Mr Yudhishthra Nathan for more details surrounding his claim on Friday last week that Pritam Singh had said conservative religious men would not like to have an MP who was sexually assaulted. Singh had purportedly said that in a meeting on Aug 10, 2021, with Mr Nathan and Ms Loh Pei Ying.
The defence counsel asks if Mr Nathan told Singh that it was a bigoted response.
To this, Mr Nathan replies: “Frankly, it wasn’t surprising that Mr Singh said that.”
Asked if those were Singh’s exact words, Mr Nathan says there was “possibly a slight rephrasing but essentially, that’s what he said”.
Mr Jumabhoy then points out that Mr Nathan had not mentioned the purported comment by Singh when testifying to the Committee of Privileges (COP) in 2021, just months after Ms Khan first told the lie.
“And the reason it’s not there is… he didn’t say it, correct? You’re just making it up,” says Mr Jumabhoy.
Mr Nathan disagrees. He says he may not have told the COP, but he remembers saying it to the police in 2022.
10:59
‘I’ve taken Mr Singh’s position on party issues’: Yudhishthra Nathan
Mr Andre Jumabhoy continues to press Mr Yudhishthra Nathan on why he did not question party leader Pritam Singh on his supposed advice to Ms Raeesah Khan to take her lie to the grave.
The lawyer highlights an instance of Mr Nathan publicly questioning Singh on the Workers’ Party’s (WP) stance on LGBTQ issues in a 2019 speech the WP chief gave at the National University of Singapore. Mr Nathan had, in a Facebook post, criticised Singh that it was disingenuous for a politician to praise his LGBT friends for being upstanding citizens, only to refrain from standing up for their rights.
Mr Jumabhoy pointed out that when Mr Nathan disagrees with a party position, he is capable of articulating it. To that, Mr Nathan says it is on a case-by-case basis, but that he “wouldn’t see a need to do that all the time”.
The lawyer asks Mr Nathan when was the last time he had been aware that an MP had lied in Parliament. He responds that it was when Singh was accused of plagiarism in a 2013 speech in Parliament.
Mr Jumabhoy rephrases his question and asks when was the last time Mr Nathan was aware, in relation to the Government’s response to what a WP MP had said in Parliament, that they had made a serious allegation.
Mr Nathan concedes that it was after the Leader of the House said, following Ms Khan’s Aug 3, 2021, speech, that parties must be ready to substantiate serious allegations they make in the House.
Mr Jumabhoy asks: “So bearing in mind that you were surprised and expected the party leaders to investigate, and taking into account that you are quite capable of challenging party positions, you don’t say anything in relation to the direction the party is going to take, correct?”
Mr Nathan replies: “But I’ve also taken Mr Singh’s direction on party issues and matters most of the time when I worked with him.”
10:33
Yudhishthra Nathan says, ‘I’ve come to accept the party position’
Mr Andre Jumabhoy makes reference to a meeting that took place on Aug 10, 2021, between Mr Pritam Singh, Ms Loh Pei Ying and Mr Yudhishthra Nathan.
He asks Mr Nathan if he did not ask questions about what was to be done about the lie that Ms Raeesah Khan had said in Parliament.
Mr Nathan says no, and adds that it was “because I’ve come to accept the party position”.
Mr Jumabhoy asks if Mr Nathan knew he could not trust what Ms Khan was telling him. To which, Mr Nathan says he did not necessarily know.
Mr Jumabhoy asks Mr Nathan why he did not ask Singh if what Ms Khan had said in the message was true.
Mr Nathan says it was because “Mr Singh is a party leader (and) Ms Khan is my MP”. He adds that “first of all, I trusted that she had said in the message, and secondly, I think if Mr Singh wanted action to have (been) taken, he probably would have conveyed that to Ms Loh and I at some point”.
Mr Jumabhoy asks Mr Nathan why he did not ask Singh if he had told Ms Khan to “take this to the grave”. Mr Nathan says he did not feel a need to “because I was initially surprised, but I accepted the party position”.
10:18
Defence asks Yudhishthra Nathan to recount Aug 7 Zoom call when Raeesah came clean to him and Loh Pei Ying
Mr Andre Jumabhoy asks Mr Yudhishthra Nathan to recount the Zoom call he had with Ms Raeesah Khan and Ms Loh Pei Ying on Aug 7, 2021.
Mr Nathan says Ms Khan told them during that call that she had admitted to Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh about her lie in Parliament.
Mr Jumabhoy then questions him on what advice he had given Ms Khan over the course of the call.
Mr Nathan says he cannot remember what he might have advised Ms Khan during the call, but that he might have told her to follow what Singh and the WP leaders wanted her to do.
“But in general, I don’t remember Ms Loh and I giving her much advice,” he tells the court. “It was really more to hear her out. In fact, most of the call was really just us watching her break down and waiting for her to kind of like put herself back together and also tell us what had happened.”
When the defence asks if – at any point in the call – he chastised Ms Khan for having lied in the first place, Mr Nathan says no.
Mr Jumabhoy then asks if he had told Ms Khan that she would have to tell the truth. He replies that he did not, and that he thought their approach at the time was to “wait and see what the party leaders would do”.
Mr Jumabhoy asks Mr Nathan whether it was due to Ms Khan’s emotional state on the Zoom call that he did not tell her to come clean. Mr Nathan says it was primarily because he and Ms Loh had “understood that her response to this situation was not our call to make at that point in time”.
“But as friends, was that not something you volunteered?” presses Mr Jumabhoy.
Mr Nathan responds: “Ms Khan was my Member of Parliament. She’s not just my friend, not just my MP, but my senior party colleague in a political position.”
10:06
Yudhishthra Nathan says friendship with Raeesah developed over time
The defence questions Mr Yudhishthra Nathan about his relationship with Ms Raeesah Khan.
Mr Nathan says it is fair to say that he and Ms Khan were close friends, but their friendship developed over time. He agrees with the defence that he was someone whom Ms Khan confided in and that as time progressed, he had, by 2021, come to have a social relationship with her outside of Workers’ Party events.
Defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy asks if Ms Khan was a person whom Mr Nathan trusted at that point in time. Mr Nathan replies yes. He agrees with Mr Jumabhoy that he had no reason to suspect she had lied to him.
Mr Jumabhoy then points out that Ms Khan had lied to Mr Nathan on multiple occasions between Aug 3, 2021 – when she gave her Parliament speech that contained the untrue anecdote – and Aug 7, when she came clean to him.
Asked if the suggestions he gave to Ms Khan between Aug 3 and Aug 7 – dealing with questions that arose from Ms Khan’s speech – were on the basis that Ms Khan had been telling the truth, Mr Nathan says yes.
09:28
Defence likely to focus on Yudhishthra Nathan’s redacted messages during cross-examination
Pritam Singh’s defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy will likely focus on the messages sent by Mr Yudhishthra Nathan in a group chat, which included Ms Loh Pei Ying and former Workers’ Party MP Raeesah Khan, that were redacted when the two cadres submitted evidence to the Committee of Privileges (COP).
Mr Jumabhoy previously grilled Ms Loh about this redaction. She admitted last week to lying about the real reason she made the redaction, which was that the messages did not look good for Mr Nathan.
One of the messages, sent on Oct 12, 2021, read: “I think we should just not give too many details. At most apologise for not having the facts about her age accurate.”
On Friday last week, Mr Nathan said he sent the message after Ms Khan told the second untruth on Oct 4, 2021. He added that by Oct 12, Singh and the three of them in the group chat were “all on the same page that she should come clean”.
Mr Nathan said he felt the message could be redacted as it was “immaterial to the COP investigation”.
He told the court that after he gave his testimony to the COP, he was at some point asked to head down to the Parliament House library, where he sat next to COP member Rahayu Mahzam, who is from the People’s Action Party, to do his redactions in front of a computer screen.
He said they went through the messages that had been extracted from his phone one by one. While going through the messages, they would talk about what could be redacted and what should stay.
Ms Rahayu then had to leave for constituency work, and Mr Nathan said he stayed on until Parliament staff had to close the library.
The staff asked him to complete the rest of the redactions and send these by e-mail, which he proceeded to do so in his car at the building’s carpark.
09:27
Yudhishthra Nathan arrives in court
Former Workers’ Party cadre Yudhishthra Nathan arrives in court. He will be cross-examined by Pritam Singh’s defence lawyer Andre Jumabhoy today.
09:24
Pritam Singh arrives in court
Workers’ Party chief Pritam Singh arrives in court for the sixth day of his trial.
