The Select Committee on deliberate online falsehoods will look into complaints lodged against it by witnesses called up to give oral evidence.

Committee chairman responds to media queries

Committee chairman Charles Chong responded to Channel News Asia queries on Tuesday night, April 3.

He said:

"We have received the feedback/ complaints... The Select Committee will look into the allegations and review the transcripts before responding to those who have written to us."

Parliament also responded

Following Chong's response, a spokesperson from Parliament also issued an official response saying that the committee is reviewing requests to review the submissions sent to it.

The spokesperson told CNA:

"As the chairman had made clear to the representors, the full verbatim transcripts will also be sent in due course to them, to check, if there are any errors."

Videos of the committee’s sessions with all 65 witness testimonies are available online, parliament also said.

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Main gripes of witnesses

The complaints against the select committee hearings were made by leading activists in Singapore after they gave oral evidence in person.

Prior to the hearings, they had put forward written submissions.

One of the main gripes was that the official summaries of evidence, which were released by the committee, misrepresented their views they had presented under oath.

The signed statement was by freelance journalist Kirsten Han and social worker Jolovan Wham, civil society group Function 8, historian Thum Ping Tjin and The Online Citizen's chief editor Terry Xu.

More similar concerns raised

Human rights group Maruah issued a separate statement on Facebook on Tuesday, a day after the joint statement by activists, to voice similar concerns.

It said that the proceedings were at times "overly focused" on showing that the witnesses were propagators of falsehoods through "a process of intense interrogation".