AHTC Court Case - Pritam Singh

Apparently serving his in-camp training (ICT), WP's Pritam Singh showed up in Court in his No. 4 uniform. To many NSmen, this is clearly a cheap trick as it takes mere minutes to change out of uniform. Sources also tell us that Pritam had been similarly excused from ICT before to attend court cases and in each of those instances he had changed.

Pritam's appearance in Court in his No. 4 can therefore be seen as a cheap attempt to play the patriot card. This same tactic was used most famously by Oliver North during the Iran-Contra Scandal.

Unfortunately for Pritam, Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon did not fall for the trick and issued Pritam an ultimatum. AHTC now has until Friday to appoint an independent accountant. Failing which, the Court will appoint. CJ Menon also concluded that AHTC and or its lawyer Peter Low was less than truthful in their earlier affidavits and, essentially implied, that AHTC was playing a delay game.

The end of AHTC, and the Workers Party, has begun. Once an independent auditor is appointed, the truth about the missing funds will be revealed. We wouldn't be surprised if The Workers Party now suddenly comes clean and pleads for voters forgiveness. In fact, the WP only managed to do 1 of the 2 transfers of sinking funds ordered by the Court. So money is definitely missing.

While some may consider this a loss for democracy in Singapore, we believe that it is more dangerous for Singapore to have opposition members without the correct values.

AHPETC High Court Appeal - Pritam Incompetent or Dishonest?

I have been closely following the court case as, like many of my friends, we had high hopes for the WP to be the alternative to the PAP. Sadly, the WP imploded with its mismanagement of its Town Council and, in my opinion, this contributed significantly to their dismal performance at GE2015. Whether it was incompetence or financial impropriety, AHPETC is the albatross hanging around the heads of Low Thia Khiang, Sylvia Lim and Pritam Singh.

From the newspapers reports, I learnt that  Ajunied-Hougang Town Council (AHTC) nominated an essentially one-man operation called Business Assurance to be the accountant to solve their many problems.  HDB asked some questions presumably because it has concerns about the company’s capabilities. The TC declined to reply and referred the issue to the Court. Last week, the Court directed the TC to provide more information on Business Assurance.

I am really surprised that AHTC chose this company because if they had bothered to ask around in the industry, they would have discovered some interesting facts about this one-man operation owned and managed by Alex Chai Chon Fatt. Being an accountant, I am aware that it is fairly common knowledge among many of us in the industry that Alex Chai has failed his Practice Monitoring Programme (PMP) and that he is restricted from conducting audits of companies for a period of 1 year. In fact, this is the second time that Alex Chai has failed his PMP.

For those that are unsure about what the PMP is, the PMP is the regulatory instrument to promote audit quality. Audit quality is the cornerstone of market confidence in the reliability of the financial information upon which the market makes capital allocation decisions. The PMP provides quality assurance to the market through ascertaining whether public accountants have complied with the prescribed auditing standards, methods, procedures and other requirements. This assurance gives users of financial reports increased confidence in audit opinions.

Did Pritam Singh know all this when he selected and nominated the firm? If he did, he was pulling a fast one to mislead HDB and the Court. If not, he has been sloppy because there is every reason why he or his GM should have conducted due diligence checks to ensure that the company is in good standing before selecting and nominating them. They would have found out if they had asked Business Assurance directly because I don’t think Alex would lie about failing the PMP and is under restriction as these are unavoidable facts.

I eagerly await the unfolding drama in Court this week. MND and HDB will definitely be aware that Alex Chai is no longer qualified to conduct the audit. In fact, a quick Google check will tell you that since 14 Nov 2014, Alex Chai had joined Transcorp Holdings as its financial controller. So what is the WP and Pritam Singh up to?  If you ask me, it is likely that Pritam  will now waste the Court’s time by giving some excuse to avoid answering the question directly as to whether they knew or whether they didn’t bother to conduct basic due diligence checks on  Business Assurance and Alex Chai’s professional standing before selecting and nominating it.

BTW while I cannot confirm this, I also heard talk in the industry that AHTC’s latest auditor was Audit Alliance and its senior partner, Lee Tai Wai had also failed his PMP. 

AHPETC - WP Misleads Public with Creative Headlines

The Worker’s Party continues to mislead the public with their creative headlines.

LIES

In an amazing announcement, Pritam Singh, Chairman of Aljunied Town Council (AHTC) announced that the "AHTC welcomes the Court’s rejection of the submission of the Attorney-General’s Chambers (representing MND & HDB) that AHTC’s conduct of its defence during the course of the hearings at the High Court and at the Court of Appeal was egregious and somehow improper.”

In their subsequent statement published on their own website, the WP claims that “at the hearing on 7 January 2016, AHTC, the Ministry of National Development (MND) and the Housing & Development Board (HDB) have been ordered to bear their own legal costs.” The WP also claimed that they welcomed the “the Court’s rejection of the submission of the Attorney-General’s Chambers (representing MND & HDB) that AHTC’s conduct of its defence during the course of the hearings at the High Court and at the Court of Appeal was egregious and somehow improper.”

REALITY

Firstly, the Court usually requires litigating parties to bear their own costs. So by arguing that the WP had won as the HDB and MND had to bear their own cost, is the same as saying that HDB and MND had also won as WP had been ordered to bear their own legal costs. It makes no sense.

Secondly, MND and HDB never asked for carte blanche to look into AHPETC’s financial affairs. In fact, AHTC had tried and failed to get the court to prevent the appointed independent accountant from looking into FMSS and FMSI. The High Court had in fact extended the authority of the independent accountant to look beyond FMSS and FMSI if it is necessary to recover money lost.

TRUTH

What we can say is that the WP is skilled in the art of manipulation. They realise that people seldom read beyond the headlines and as long as they push out misleading headlines, they will win war of public perception. In order not to be deceived, and to see the WP for what they really are, we urge Singaporeans to take a second look at what they are saying, and then to verify the facts.

The Workers Party Manifesto

The Workers' Party (WP) manifesto constantly espouses the need for the ruling government to be transparent and accountable to Singaporeans. Unfortunately, to the WP, the concept of transparency and accountability only applies to the Government and not themselves. 

One only needs to look at the way the WP and its members behave to know the values that they hold. For example, on the WP Facebook page, the WP openly states that they will delete any posts that violates their principles of being rational, responsible and respectful. However, when a WP supporter violates their stated principles, Daniel Goh does not follow his own rules. These double standards extend beyond this Facebook example to the now infamous statement by Pritam Singh where he says he will not answer to Parliament.

Singaporeans need to assess for themselves the character of opposition members like Pritam Singh and Daniel Goh. They say that if I can't even trust you with the small things, how can I trust you with the big things. A Manifesto should not only be words on a piece of paper. It should be a document whose principles and values you live by.