The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has issued a Correction Notice to the political blog Political Sophistry over a post published on 16 July.
The post alleged that Transport Minister S Iswaran’s arrest was withheld by both Prime Minister (PM) Lee Hsien Loong and Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) Lawrence Wong until last Friday evening (14 July).
However, it is in fact the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB)’s operational judgement to release such information and not the ministers’.
The statements that PM Lee and DPM Wong made on 12 July were hence consistent with the press release the CPIB put out the same day.
As such, the PMO has directed the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA) Office to issue a Correction Notice to Political Sophistry.
The blog post “Upfront and transparent? A timeline of the CPIB investigation into Transport Minister Iswaran” alleged that both PM Lee and DPM Wong should have known about Minister Iswaran’s arrest, but deliberately chose to withhold that information.
It further questioned why the CPIB only stated that Minister Iswaran was arrested after media queries.
PMO said the facts are as follows:
On 12 July, the CPIB issued a press release that Minister Iswaran was assisting them with the investigation into a case they had uncovered.
The CPIB also acknowledged the interest of members of the public in this case as a Minister was being interviewed by them.
PM Lee separately issued a statement that the formal investigation began on 11 July and Minister Iswaran was assisting the CPIB with the ongoing investigations.
Source: S Iswaran on Facebook
On the same day, DPM Wong said that the CPIB needed to interview Minister Iswaran as part of further investigations.
He said, “We will be upfront and transparent, and we will not sweep anything under the carpet, even if they are potentially embarrassing or damaging to the PAP and to the government.”
DPM Wong also stated that he was unable to provide more information because CPIB investigations were ongoing.
The next day, on 13 July, PMO said that Minister Iswaran would remain in Singapore during his leave of absence.
He would also have no access to any official resources and government buildings.
On 14 July, in response to media queries, the CPIB stated that Minister Iswaran and Ong Beng Seng were arrested on 11 July and subsequently released on bail.
“Whether to arrest a person under investigation is an operational judgement by CPIB,” the press release stated.
Additionally, the CPIB reserves its right to make public whether someone has been arrested for investigations in connection with its cases.
Ministers do not release such information. Instead, it is the CPIB that does so.
On 12 July, Minister Iswaran was assisting the CPIB with their investigations and had not been arrested yet.
At the time, both PM Lee and DPM Wong stated the same — that he was assisting CPIB with investigations.
It is therefore untrue that PM or DPM Wong did not want to disclose the fact of Minister Iswaran’s arrest because it was politically embarrassing, or that DPM had deliberately withheld information on the arrests because he wanted to conceal the truth.
Nor were they “abdicating their responsibility to disclose such information”, as they did not wish to deviate from what CPIB had announced.
“Ministers have to let CPIB independently decide on the release of operational information. CPIB must be afforded the necessary time and space it needs to conduct a proper, thorough, and independent investigation.”
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office Indranee Rajah has directed the POFMA Office to issue a Correction Direction to the Political Sophistry blog.
MS News has verified that Political Sophistry has complied with the Correction Direction on their site.
Source: Political Sophistry
The press release ends with a reminder to the public “not to speculate and/or spread unverified rumours”.
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Featured image adapted from S Iswaran on Facebook and Political Sophistry.
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