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A
desperate Jayakumar evades Chee's questions
20
Oct 07
Confronted
by uncomfortable truths, Minister for Law Mr S Jayakumar resorted
to obfuscation to minimize the embarrassment the PAP Government
had to face in front of a crowd of international lawyers and
legal experts at the IBA conference.
Mr Jayakumar during
his speech repeated the tired and discredited argument that the
rule of law needed to be "contextualised" to suit the
needs of different cultures and societies.
He used the
example of the much-criticised Internal Security Act to justify
the Government's crackdown on terrorists.
Dr Chee Soon
Juan then rose to challenge Mr Jayakumar's views. The SDP
secretary-general asked why the minister did not tell the
audience how opposition leaders were detained without trial. He
cited the case of Mr Chia Thye Poh who was imprisoned under the
ISA for 32 years.
He also pointed out that he was
repeatedly sued for defamation and prosecuted for exercising his
right to free speech.
The visibly nervous session chair,
Mr Francis Neate, asked Dr Chee to wind up his intervention to
which the SDP leader said that the IBA had promised him that
there would be a meaningful discussion of the rule of law in
Singapore during the symposium.
Dr Chee had no intention
of paying $180 just to ask questions so that Mr Jaykumar could
spew more propaganda.
"The Government has had its
say. Now I'm sure the audience would like to hear the other side
of the story," Dr Chee said, turning to the audience which
broke out into a loud and sustained applause.
Seeing
this, Mr Neate retreated and allowed Dr Chee to continue.
When
it came to Mr Jayakumar's turn to respond, he evaded the
questions and charges by resorting to the time-honoured PAP
tactic of attacking the person, saying that Dr Chee was trying to
turn the symposium into a theatre of Singapore politics.
There
is a saying that it you cannot stand the heat, get out of the
kitchen. In choosing to speak at the symposium which was opened
to the public, surely the Minister should have been prepared to
face questions about the Government's authoritarian ways,
especially at a forum entitled The Rule of Law.
The
minister feigned hurt and gave the impression that he was
responding to Dr Chee "out of respect to the Chairman and
IBA delegates." The truth is that the audience would not
have it any other way.
And when he finished answering, no
one applauded.
In fact, the Government had tried to
prevent the symposium from being opened to the public. But it
could not do so without inflicting more damage to its reputation.
Failing to stop the symposium from being opened to the
public, the Government tried to get the foreign speakers to
submit a written copy of their speeches. This apparently met with
consternation from the some of the invited speakers.
US
Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy's name was originally on
the list but was taken off at the last minute.
This was
just as well because, as with the other speakers, the subject of
his speech would probably have been at variance with Mr
Jayakumar's. Mr Hisashi Owada, a Japanese judge with the
International Court of Justice, reiterated that the rule of
law should not be confused with the rule by law, a point
repeatedly made by the Singapore Democrats.
Another
speaker, Ms Ambiga Sreenevasam who was the president of the
Malaysian Bar Council (MBC), described how the MBC had defended
the independence of the judiciary from interference by the
Executive by going to jail if necessary.
Mr Albie Sachs, a
judge in South Africa, gave a moving speech that received a
standing ovation. Describing his ordeal when he was detained
without trial by the South African apartheid government even
though he was white, Justice Sachs said that he had struggled
with the blacks for equality.
With only a stump
protruding from his right shoulder, the judge revealed how he
survived a bomb attack that ripped off his right arm. He declared
that the rule of law must be in place to protect human dignity,
freedom and democracy.
During the breaks, many of the
delegates congratulated Dr Chee for his intervention. One of them
said: "We didn't know that it was that bad. Frankly, I'm
appalled that the IBA held the conference here."
Another
lawyer from Asia commented: "Your Government looked so bad
in there. We all know what's going on."
A top
government lawyer from Europe whispered: "Great speech! It
was important."
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