Singapore’s serial protester, Yan Jun
SINGAPORE: Singapore is free from protests and demonstrations? Think again. The island republic has at least one protester and a solo act, too, for the past four years.
The online media calls him “the serial protester” and his name is Yan Jun, 43. He was arrested this week after staging a one-man protest at Raffles Place and refusing to stop after being told to do so by police officers.
Community blogging platform The Online Citizen (TOC) said: “Yan held two signs this time around, which read ‘Singapore’s Legal System is TOTALLY Corrupt!’ and ‘PM LEE AND PAP STEP DOWN’.
“In a video showing the protest and subsequent arrest, Yan can be heard saying to the police officers as they handcuffed him, ‘You should have arrested me half an hour ago’.”
Yan had given notification to various ministries, including the Home Ministry, about 3.50pm that he would stage a protest at 5pm the same day.
When he started, no police officers were seen until about 5.30pm.
Two police officers went to talk to Yan, while others monitored from a distance before the arrest, said TOC.
This is the second time the former research assistant was arrested for protesting this year.
The first was on Feb 28 outside of Raffles Place MRT. In March, he faced two charges under the Public Order Act for protesting for that incident.
He was also charged with one count of taking part in a public assembly without a permit, one count of disobeying a police officer’s instruction to leave the area and for refusing to cooperate with an investigation officer, said TOC.
That February protest was against Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam, Commissioner of Prisons Desmond Chin and retired Court of Appeal judge Chao Hick Tin.
During the one-man protest, Yan purportedly displayed a placard calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong over what he had allegedly claimed to be “Singapore’s Watergate scandal and nepotism”.
On the reverse side of the placard was allegedly printed, “Protest against the Hong Kong government for betraying the sovereignty of China in the armoured vehicles conspiracy!” in Mandarin, said Yahoo News Singapore.
A report said district judge Luke Tan sentenced Yan to six months and two weeks’ jail for the offence and fined him S$5,000 (RM15,316). The conviction last year follows a string of at least seven similar offences beginning 2016.