Illustration charts in the background of the photo: Courtesy of Kueh-lapis. The blue represents Aljunied-Hougang Town Council managed by the opposition Workers Party
Tan Wah Piow
Is Singapore’s political and judicial system afflicted with a terminal disease – Selective Persecution Syndrome (SPS)?
What is Selective Persecution?
If 5 blacks, and 15 whites are arrested for shoplifting, but only the blacks are charged, then this is selective prosecution.
Because such prosecutions are selective based on the colour of the skin, the prosecutions amount to racial discrimination, and are selective persecution of a racial group. Likewise, if only one political group is singled out for prosecution, it is selective persecution. When such a practice is institutionalized, the nation is afflicted with the SPS disease.
The following are symptoms of this debilitating political disease.
- Members of the opposition parties are habitually prosecuted for the slightest breach of the law.
- Members of the ruling party could avoid prosecution for similar, and more serious crimes.
In a healthy legal system, a Defendant who suspects he is victim of selective persecution may apply to the court to quash the prosecution for abuse of process. To be successful, he would have to persuade the judge to order discovery of evidence from the prosecution and the relevant authorities of how similar trespasses were dealt with. The discovery would require the authorities to release detail paper and electronic trails showing how the decision to prosecute the particular case was made, as compared to similar trespassing which did not end in prosecution. Such an application could only be successful before a robust Judge. Unfortunately robust judges are usually an extinct species in a diseased system.
The cure to this SPS disease was recently discovered in a neighbouring country. The prescription is a heavy dose of “The Malaysia-lite Peoples’ Mandate Pill”.
This Pill has of the following ingredients -, a united front of opposition parties working closely with politicized NGOs, social activists, progressive intelligentsia, politicized progressive social media, a determined people and a common manifesto for change.
If the disease if left untreated, the patient will perish.
Note: For evidence of outbreak of SPS disease in Singapore, google ‘How bad are Workers’ Party leaders’ by Kueh-lapis.github.io
