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Singapore blogger ordered to pay PM 29,000 SGD in defamation lawsuit

Xinhua, January 12, 2015 Adjust font size:

A Singapore blogger who was found to have defamed Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong was ordered on Monday to pay the prime minister 29,000 Singapore dollars (21, 642 U.S. dollars) for legal fees and related expenses.

Chang Li Lin, press secretary to the prime minister, said in a statement that the amount is "for the legal fees and related expenses incurred up to the conclusion of the application for summary judgment."

"The dates for the subsequent hearings are not confirmed," she added.

Roy Ngerng alleged in a blogpost in May last year that the Central Provident Fund monies had been misappropriated. The blogpost titled "Where Your CPF Money Is Going: Learning From The City Harvest Trial" used quite some graphs and charts.

The prime minister filed the defamation lawsuit against Ngerng later, saying Ngerng had continued to disseminate articles and videos to the same effect elsewhere even after he agreed to apologize and remove the blogpost.

In November, a judge ruled that Ngerng had defamed Lee with his posts. The blogger was ordered to be restrained from publishing or disseminating the allegation that Lee is guilty of criminal misappropriation of the monies paid by Singaporeans to the Central Provident Fund, or any words and/or images to the same effect.

Officials from the Singapore government have said that it is necessary to defend the reputation of the prime minister.

"A leader who does nothing when he is accused of criminally misappropriating monies from the state pension system must engender mistrust in his honesty and leadership. The person making the accusations should have basis for the accusations, and should not be gratuitously lying," wrote Foo Kong Seng, Singapore's Consul-General to Hong Kong. Endi