Singapore's Minister for Finance Heng Swee Keat has instructed the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulations Act (POFMA) office to issue four correction directions over claims that Temasek Holdings CEO Ho Ching's annual salary is "around S$100 million".

4 correction directions issued for "false claims"

According to the POFMA office, a correction direction is issued to a person who has "communicated a falsehood that affects the public interest".

The four correction directions are issued to:

1. HardwareZone user "darksiedluv"
2. the Temasek Review's Facebook page
3. The Online Citizen's (TOC) Facebook page and website
4. People's Voice Party (PVP) leader Lim Tean.

Lim was issued the correction direction as he had shared the "falsehood" on his Facebook page, the POFMA office said.

The authors had made various claims that Ho's salary is "NT$2.1 billion", "about 100 million SGD" or "S$99 million a year", the POFMA office said.

Not the first time Lim has been POFMA-ed

This is not the first time that the authors have been issued POFMA correction directions.

Minister for Home Affairs K Shanmugam activated POFMA on Jan. 22 this year against TOC for "false" allegations that claim Singapore prison officers used "brutal" methods to execute condemned prisoners.

Lim has also previously had POFMA invoked against him by Education Minister Ong Ye Kung, and Chan Chun Sing, in his capacity as minister-in-charge of the People's Association. 

Lim has since responded to the correction direction on a Facebook post.

In a Facebook post, TOC states that it has already filed its application to "cancel the correction direction to the Minister" at 7pm.

Temasek: Claim is false

In a press release issued on Sunday, April 19, Temasek had also refuted such claims, referring to them as "chatter based on an Asian talk show commentary".

Saying that such a claim is false, Temasek further said Ho Ching's annual compensation is "neither the highest within Temasek, nor is she amongst the top five highest paid executives in Temasek".

The claim about Ho's salary was first made an an EBC News programme that aired on Monday, April 13, which also discussed the comment she made over Taiwan's mask donation to Singapore.

AXEL SCHMIDT/AFP via Getty Images