MINISTER REFUTES ABUSE CLAIMS
2 defendants forced to apologise, make donation to migrant workers’ fund
THE Singapore government has strongly denied allegations that its manpower minister had enriched herself from the development of temporary facilities to house foreign workers infected with Covid-19.
The government said the allegations of profiteering and corruption over the development of the facilities were false and malicious.
Manpower Minister Josephine Teo had also taken legal action against two people over the online claims.
According to the South China
Morning Post, the government’s forceful rebuttal was accompanied by a statement by Teo’s lawyers describing the comments as untrue, scurrilous and completely baseless.
Local blogs in recent days had been highlighting posts by Facebook users who questioned the involvement of governmentlinked urban planning firm Surbana Jurong, whose international chief executive Teo Eng Cheong is Teo’s husband, in the conversion of the Singapore Expo, an exhibition centre, into a facility housing 8,000 beds.
The centre was among several so-called community care facilities that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s government hastily developed in April as Covid-19 infections surged through cramped dormitories that housed hundreds of thousands of foreign workers.
The Singapore government had to quickly ramp up capacity for the workers at the time as they came under heavy criticism for not preparing well enough.
The online posts about Teo and her husband questioned how Surbana Jurong was awarded the project.
Channel News Asia reported that in a joint statement on Wednesday, the Health Ministry (MOH) and National Development Ministry (MND) said the allegations of profiteering and corruption were false and malicious.
Detailing the process in which the community care facilities were developed, MOH and MND said those facilities, along with additional government quarantine facilities and community recovery facilities, had to be “built and prepared quickly, in a matter of days”.
They said Teo and Health Minister Gan Kim Yong were not involved in the selection of Surbana Jurong for the Singapore Expo project or in the process of managing its costs.
Teo said that while she was legally entitled to substantial damages for these serious and baseless allegations, she had decided not to pursue the matter if the two authors withdrew their allegations and apologised.
The authors were also told to make donations of S$1,000 each to the government-linked Migrant Workers’ Assistance Fund.
Singapore’s leaders including Prime Minister Lee have in the past successfully won libel suits for accusations of nepotism and corruption.