Penalties for assault on women ‘weak’

Sex harassment and abuse not taken seriously enough, say activists

SEXUAL harassment and assaults against women are not being taken seriously enough in Singapore, activists warn, after students at elite universities were given punishments criticised as too lenient for their crimes.

In the most recent incident, a 23-year-old spent just 12 days behind bars after he tried to strangle his ex-girlfriend during a vicious assault.

The city-state is known for its tough approach to law and order, with vandalism punishable by caning, while drug trafficking and murder carry the death penalty.

But campaigners say crimes against women have long been minimalised – marital rape was only criminalised this year.

“The justice system is very harsh on people who vandalise stateowned property. But you want to threaten and violate a woman’s life? Oh yeah, sure.

“It’s not as serious, is the message (authorities) are giving,” said Pamela Ng, a spokeswoman for the Aim For Zero campaign against sexual violence.

There are also concerns the academic potential of male perpetrators is being prioritised over the actual effect of sex crimes on women.

This echoes criticisms of incidents at prestigious schools in the US, including the six-month imprisonment of Brock Turner for three counts of sexual assault, where a judge feared a longer sentence would severely “impact” the Stanford University swimmer.

Last year, National University of Singapore (NUS) student Monica Baey took to social media to protest the light punishment given to a male student who filmed her in a dormitory shower.

Her decision to go public was dubbed the city-state’s #MeToo moment and is credited with encouraging other victims to come forward.

But critics say recent cases involving men of privilege show not enough has changed.

In July, Yin Zi Qin, a dentistry student at NUS, was jailed for less than two weeks and asked to conduct 80 hours of community service despite pleading guilty to strangling his ex-girlfriend and pressing his thumb into her eye until she lost consciousness.

The judge opted for softer “community-based sentencing” put forward by the prosecution as he was a first-time offender, cooperated with authorities, and voluntarily sought counselling and apologised to the victim.

But it provoked a public backlash with some angry that the privileged only get a “slap on the wrists” for serious crimes.

“I can’t believe the sentence is so light! I guess NUS students have such a bright future that they can get away with any crime,” commented Maruko Chan on a social media post about the ruling.

In another case, NUS student Terence Siow Kai Yuan was sentenced to 21 months of supervised probation for molesting a woman on a train and at a station.

The judge rejected the prosecution’s call for a custodial sentence, saying he had a high chance of being rehabilitated given his academic record and “relatively minor” nature of his acts, according to court documents.

However, his victim told The New Paper, the attack was not “spur of the moment” and the impact on her had not been minor.

Siow was later jailed for two weeks after prosecutors appealed.

Following the July case, women’s rights group AWARE raised concerns that more consideration was being shown for the assailant than the impact on the victims.

“Rehabilitation is important but this should not depend on the educational status of the perpetrator,” AWARE executive director Corinna Lim adds.