SINGAPORE – The trial of Workers’ Party (WP) chief and Leader of the Opposition Pritam Singh was stood down on Oct 22 as the court heard that his lawyer, Mr Andre Jumabhoy, was sick.

       After over an hour’s delay of the day’s proceedings, Singh’s other lawyer, Mr Aristotle Emmanuel Eng Zhen Yang, told the court that Mr Jumabhoy was unwell and had received a medical certificate stating he was unfit for court for two days.

       Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan approved the defence’s application for the trial to be stood down until the afternoon of Oct 23.

       Mr Eng said he would update the court in the morning on Mr Jumabhoy’s situation, and whether proceedings could resume at 2.30pm on Oct 23.

       Singh’s trial was supposed to resume at 11am on Oct 22, but was delayed till about 12.20pm as lawyers from both sides met the judge in chambers.

       Both the prosecution and the defence had been anticipating the judge’s decision on an application that Mr Jumabhoy had made the day before, to have former WP cadre Yudhishthra Nathan’s unredacted messages from Oct 4 to 12, 2021, tendered in court.

       Mr Jumabhoy had also asked for the redacted versions of these messages between Mr Nathan, fellow WP cadre Loh Pei Ying, and former Sengkang MP Raeesah Khan, and the reasons Mr Nathan had given in 2021 to the Committee of Privileges (COP) for making the redactions.

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       This was a reasonable line of inquiry as it goes directly to whether the testimonies of Mr Nathan and Ms Loh are credible, said Mr Jumabhoy.

       The prosecution had objected to the application, arguing that the COP’s findings and the redacted messages were not relevant to the criminal trial.

       Deputy Attorney-General Ang Cheng Hock noted that the first charge Singh faces has to do with what happened in his meeting with Ms Khan on Aug 8, 2021, while the second charge has to do with what happened at a second meeting on Oct 3, 2021. The redacted messages were all from after this period of time.

       Judge Tan said on Oct 21 that part of the prosecution’s case relies on the Oct 12 meeting between Singh, Mr Nathan and Ms Loh, and as such, the credibility of the two WP cadres is an issue, as “it goes to whether their evidence is to be believed or not”.

       The judge said he would review the message logs alongside evidence from Mr Nathan before making a decision.

       Singh is contesting two charges over his alleged lies to a parliamentary committee convened in November 2021 to investigate Ms Khan’s untruth in Parliament.

       Ms Khan had, on Aug 3, 2021, told Parliament about how she had accompanied a sexual assault victim to a police station, where the victim was treated insensitively. She repeated the claim before the House on Oct 4 the same year, before admitting to her lie on Nov 1, 2021.

       For each charge, Singh faces a maximum fine of $7,000, a jail term of up to three years, or both.

       The defence is expected to wrap up its cross-examination of Mr Nathan on Oct 23. After the prosecution is done re-examining Mr Nathan, it is expected to call former WP secretary-general Low Thia Khiang as the next witness.