The cross-examination of Workers' Party (WP) MP Sylvia Lim by Senior Counsel Davinder Singh continued into the afternoon of Oct. 23, day 13 of the Aljunied-Hougang Town Council (AHTC) trial.

This time, towards the end of the afternoon session, Davinder charged that Lim, in her former capacity as Chairman of Aljunied-Hougang Town Council (AHTC), had breached Sections 76(4) and 81(6) of the Town Councils Financial Rules (TCFR).

On top of that, the breach of Section 81(6) involved the entire town council.

Lim disagreed that she had breached Section 76(4) but agreed that Section 81 (6) had been breached by the Town Council.

What do the two sections say?

Here's what Section 76(4) of the TCFR states:

"Where a Town Council or chairman intends to waive quotations or tenders pursuant to rule 73(14) or 74(17) and as a result the managing agent of the Town Council will be the sole supplier of the stores, services or works to the Town Council, such waiver shall not be permissible unless —

(a) the specifications of the stores, services or works have been approved by a committee comprising members of the Town Council; and

(b) the managing agent does not participate in the evaluation and recommendation for such waiver."

And here's what Section 81(6) of the TCFR states:

"For works, period quotations and contracts, there shall be a written agreement before the works or supply of services begin."

The alleged breach of Section 76(4): Lack of a tender called for the Essential Service Maintenance Unit (EMSU)

For those of you who are wondering what EMSU means, it is the current 24-hour service provided by the Town Council to attend to residents’ maintenance and urgent essential services requests.

FMSS offers to take over EMSU

For this, Davinder brought the court back to June 2, 2011, the date of the proposal made by FM Solutions & Services (FMSS) to Lim, former WP Secretary-General Low Thia Khiang and WP MP Muhamad Faisal Manap on taking over as AHTC's new managing agent.

According to Davinder, the meeting also saw FMSS propose taking over the management of the EMSU at the system's prevailing cost.

Davinder asked Lim if she was aware that the contract for EMSU would expire at the end of September 2011, and that there were four months to prepare for the tender process of a new contract for EMSU.

Lim replied yes to both.

When Davinder then asked Lim if FMSS knew of the prevailing contract sum for EMSU and its expiry date in Sept 2011 at that point, Lim answered that she could not speak for FMSS.

This brought up Davinder's next question -- whether her fellow MPs found the proposal by FMSS reasonable and whether Lim herself had any concerns about EMSU.

Lim responded that the main concern of the meeting was the proposal for the managing agent and that she had not thought much about concerns regarding EMSU.

This resulted in Davinder's charge that as the elected MPs prioritised replacing CPG Facilities Management (CPG), the current managing agent at that time, the proposal on EMSU did not concern Lim, which accordingly resulted in the matter being put on the backburner.

Lim disagreed, stating that CPG had already said they wanted to be released.

The status of a verbal agreement made between CPG and AHTC

Davinder responded by querying Lim on an email she had sent on Sept 18, 2011, which mentioned a "verbal agreement" between CPG and AHTC in extending the EMSU for six more months after September.

To this, Lim stated that she had not been personally involved in the discussion as it had been between How Weng Fan, one of the owners of FMSS, and Jeffrey Chua, the managing director of CPG.

This drew Davinder's rebuttal that How's correspondence with Chua made no mention of a verbal agreement as it was essentially a request. Rather, Lim "had decided to once again create a fiction to justify not calling a tender” as she did not have concern for the rules of the Town Council and the rationale behind them.

The meeting on Sept. 18, 2011, with FMSS

Lim voiced her disagreement, stating that the specifications of the town council had been communicated to FMSS earlier on the same day of Sept. 18 at a meeting with the Town Council committee. Lim added that this meeting was also why a second email sent out by her on the same night stated that FMSS had agreed to supply the EMSU in accordance with what the Town Council had specified.

Davinder disputed Lim's assertion, highlighting how Lim's email stated that FMSS offered to supply, which was different from agreed.

Davinder also pointed out that, Lim did not state in her email that specifications had been put to FMSS, subject to counsel approval; rather, what she had said was that FMSS offered to supply services in accordance with the scope of works laid out by the committee.

Lim doubled down on her answer, replying that FMSS agreed to work in accordance with the scope of works and that her meaning was quite clear.

Subsequently, Davinder asked Lim if it was clear to her that once the Town Council committee confirmed the specifications, the matter would go to town council for a waiver of tender.

Lim replied yes.

This prompted a back-and-forth exchange where Davinder repeatedly asked Lim if FMSS was recommending its appointment and Lim responded by insisting that FMSS was offering to do so.

The exchange ended at the intervention of Justice Kannan Ramesh, who told Davinder that he would allow a little bit more for the questioning before drawing the line, while Lim had to answer Davinder's question in substance.

Accordingly, Davinder charged that Lim breached Section 76(4) in allowing FMSS to recommend its appointment, by putting that recommendation before the committee and then having accepted that recommendation, put it up for a waiver:

"You have completely undermined the protections of the Act."

To which Lim replied:

"Disagree."

The alleged breach of Section 81(6): The absence of a written agreement

With regard to Section 81(6), Davinder noted that one of the outcomes of the steps laid out in Section 76(4) was to ensure that the town council's interests were protected in a contract. How then, could Lim say that the Town Council's interests were protected since the specifications of the EMSU had not been set into a contract?

Lim answered that she agreed that while FMSS accepted the terms the Town Council wanted, the specifications were not in the document signed by both parties.

When Davinder next asked if the rules had been breached with an oral agreement, Lim said that she agreed the specifications had to be set into contract and that as implied by the rules, she had breached them.

Davinder then brought up his next question -- whether Lim knew the rules at that time.

Lim said that she knew substantially of the rules but the rules were not in her consciousness at that time.

When Davinder then highlighted to Sylvia that she had ample opportunity to check the rules and that there was nothing stopping her from doing so, Lim replied that yes, she could have.

This led to Davinder pressing Lim on why she did not do so and was seemingly content for an oral agreement.

Lim replied that her focus was that the award of the contract should be in accordance of what was required in the acceptance of tenders.

Davinder accordingly brought up his charge that there had been a breach in the first EMSU contract under Section 81(6) of the TCFR.

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Lim agreed, stating that the breach had been pointed out to the Town Council by the Auditor General's Office audit of AHTC.

This resulted in Davinder's statement that the breach had been on the part of the entire town council.

To which Lim replied yes.

The trial continues.

Top photo by Matthias Ang

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