While Singaporeans were busy taking in everything Joseph Schooling, a rare seven-hour marathon debate was taking place in Parliament.

We'll get into what it was about shortly, but we wanted to highlight a big gostan from a few Nominated Members of Parliament (NMP) that even we didn't see coming.

Three NMPs — Associate Professor Mahdev Mohan, Kok Heng Leun and Kuik Shiao-Yin — first tabled amendments to a Bill on the laws governing contempt of court, spoke about them, but within the same afternoon and evening withdrew their proposed 14 changes to the Bill, and then voted "Aye" in the end.

The Bill was introduced in Parliament on July 11, and covers three main areas of the law of contempt: prejudicing court matters, disobeying court orders and scandalising the courts.

The bill was passed 72-9, with PAP MPs and NMPs voting for the bill and nine WP MPs voting against the bill.

Minister Shanmugam making the case for the bill

Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam argued that there were largely no changes to current contempt laws, adding that it does not make sense that "an observer’s right to speak as he wishes should override a person’s right to a fair trial".

He stood with the "ordinary folks", noting that most of the people who get charged in the State Courts "don’t write fancy blogs", and are "not lawyers, MPs or journalists -- not usually anyway".

He then took what seems to us to be a logical leap to assert that "the people who are the loudest on these issues are usually the people who can take care of themselves".

But why was this U-turn by the NMPs worth highlighting?

This is because Kok was the one who submitted a public petition on the Bill that expresses concern that the bill may restrict valid discussion of issues that are of public interest. In fact, Kok revealed in a Facebook post on Tuesday night that he agreed to do so because the civil society activists' "concerns coincided with a lot of mine".

This is also because all three NMPs appear to have legitimate grounds for several of the amendments proposed:

- Raising concern that the definition of “publish” is unduly broad. For instance, persons sharing their opinions on particular cases on Facebook might be liable under the Bill.

- Amending the phrase of "risk" to "real risk". This is because the legal requirement for being convicted for scandalising the court is of a lower threshold than the current test established by judicial precedents (i.e. the “real risk test”).

Judging from the tone of his speech, one would assume that Kok would have abstained or voted "no" on the bill. Kok's speech raised concerns about it, highlighting the implications of a Singaporean sharing a potentially contemptuous publication on Facebook to Singaporeans discussing important public matters from pending court cases.

We should also stress at this point that Kok was picked as an "arts NMP", a parliamentarian representing the arts community, who, of course, greatly values the preservation of free speech.

Rhetoric vs Action: Kuik and Kok's explanations 

It is important for parliamentarians, whether elected or nominated, to be clear and honest about their voting intentions. If they voiced reservations for a bill but did not abstain or vote against it, they should explain to the public how they came to their decision.

Yesterday, Kuik revealed her reason for voting yes -- she "was satisfied enough to vote for the Bill and dropped our amendments because we got the clarifications and confirmations we most wanted in the Hansard". Kuik also mentioned in her speech that she supported "the spirit" of the Minister's bill.

However, Kuik's views in her speech -- having a law that limits free speech and its short-term and long-term negative cultural impact on young Singaporeans -- appeared to stem from a deeply-held conviction.

Hence, it is puzzling that she decided to take the leap of faith to accept the government's clarifications and support the bill without reservation -- in other words, no amendments were requested.

In fact, she's now urging fellow Singaporeans not to be worried and "keep speaking up on it without fear".

Kuik later clarified that while her "perspective and reasons may be different from the other 2 NMPs but we were all in agreement about what was the most strategic collective decision."

In Kok's post, he said that he considered the options of  “Abstain” and “Yes” but went for the decision of “Yes” to honour the negotiation and discussion with the Ministry of Law and the Law Minister. He did not consider voting "no" because he was in support of another part of the bill concerning Disobedience to Court Orders.

For law lecturer Mohan, he told TODAY that Shanmugam’s clarifications “adequately satisfied” his concerns.

This is even though the Law Minister decided to reject their suggestion to increase the bar from "risk" to "real risk" for scandalising the court. As TODAY reported, Shanmugam noted that it was a “small, narrow” change which only mattered to lawyers.

A strategic collective decision? 

A "strategic collective decision": this was what Kuik said when she explained her reasons for her "Aye" vote on her Facebook page.

But NMPs, because they are non-partisan, are seen as the bellwethers of Parliament -- especially on politically-contentious issues.

A case in point is the 2013 Population White Paper debate in parliament where three NMPs, as well as nine Opposition MPs and NCMPs voted against the motion, with one NMP abstaining.

This of course sends a signal to the government that the votes against the motion are not merely along party lines.

More importantly, NMPs, as Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong noted in his 2009 speech during the President's address, "represent non-partisan alternative views in Parliament" and represent various interest groups.

In other words, while the committee invites nominations from the public, it formally invites nominations from these groups: business and industry, the professions, the labour movement, social and community organisations, media, arts and sports and tertiary education institutions, and the people sector.

So Kok is mistaken if he agrees with a view that "the NMP answers to no one" and that he has to firstly "answer to (him)self", before considering the views of the arts community.

Could the NMPs have voted no or to abstain?

What we do know is that the NMPs have sent a clear signal that they prioritise the right of a fair trial over free speech and they want us to trust the government on how to best implement and enforce the legislation.

But Kok revealed that he was "still (not) very convinced why the ‘real risk’ as threshold for scandalising of court was to be lowered to ‘risk’" at the end of the debate and "chose to agree to disagree".

And this is why the NMPs have yet to convince us that their sudden "change of hearts" made the most sense.

Because an important issue like this should be based on a deeply-held conviction, careful deliberation and not a mere strategic decision. And definitely not one that is decided collectively by a newly formed three NMPs interest group.

The decision that needed to be made on Monday was not between a rock ("Aye") and a hard place ("No").

No one is forcing the NMPs to vote against the government, for they could have stayed neutral and abstained because of their reservations in their speeches and public statements.

But they didn't.

Top photo from Tony Tan's Facebook page. 

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