Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong was cross-examined on the stand in High Court on Tuesday, Oct. 6.

He was cross-examined by Lim Tean, the lawyer representing Leong Sze Hian, the blogger and government critic who PM Lee is suing.

PM Lee's lawyer, Senior Counsel Davinder Singh, laid out in an 81-page opening statement the issues for the court to decide in this defamation hearing.

Here is a quick summary of what some of the main issues are:

Context of Leong's Facebook post in relation to wider news cycle

Leong's sharing of his Facebook post of the My Coverage article came on the heels of news of former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak's fall from grace after his defeat in the 2018 Malaysia election, and the preceding four years' worth of reporting on 1MDB.

By then, 1MDB had become a byword for “corruption” and “criminal activity”, Singh wrote.

The photo of PM Lee and Najib from the My Coverage article also reinforced the reader's impression of the close and cosy link between the two, Singh added.

Leong had shared on Nov. 7, 2018, the My Coverage article that falsely claimed that PM Lee was the subject of investigations over 1MDB.

On Nov. 9, 2018, the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) issued a notice to Leong to get him to remove the post.

On Nov. 10, 2018, Leong complied.

Issues that the court has to decide

This trial was for the court to decide if the offending words in the post, in their natural and ordinary meaning, were meant and understood to mean that PM Lee was complicit in criminal activity relating to 1MDB.

The court also has to decide as a separate and distinct libel, if the offending words in the article, in their natural and ordinary meaning, meant and were understood to mean that PM Lee corruptly used his position as prime minister to help Najib launder 1MDB’s billions.

The court also has to decide the extent of the injury to PM Lee's character and reputation, which have been brought into public scandal, odium and contempt.

Following the receipt of legal papers served on Leong by PM Lee's lawyers, Leong sought to speak out against the filing of the libel suit against him.

However, in the process, Leong might have aggravated the libels and the court would also have to decide if he did.

Leong's conduct before or after the publication of the libel will also be taken into account, as the court has to decide if his actions during the course of litigation, and his demeanour and attitude at trial showed if there was malice on his part.

This would also affect the eventual quantum of damages awarded to PM Lee.

Sensational allegations against PM Lee

According to Senior Counsel Singh's opening statement, the post and the article Leong shared contained sensational allegations against PM Lee, who is the prime minister of Singapore and is well known here and around the world.

The allegations were designed, both by the screaming headline and the photographs to attract the maximum readership among Singaporeans, who are those most interested in the character and integrity of the prime minister.

Second, Leong accepts that the post and the article were published in the midst of widely published and circulated reports in Singapore of money laundering and criminal conduct in relation to 1MDB, where criminal charges had been brought against Najib, the former prime minister of Malaysia.

The post and the article would, therefore, have caught the attention of and attracted interest from a significant number of persons in Singapore who would be deeply interested and concerned about the outright allegations of corruption and criminal activity against PM Lee in connection with 1MDB.

Leong's interactions and clout

The opening statement also noted that Leong addresses many of the posts on his Facebook profile page to Singaporeans and discusses issues that relate to Singapore and Singaporeans on his Facebook profile page.

Leong even goes as far as to describe himself as “prominent” and “well-known”.

It would then follow that his “friends” and “followers” include persons from Singapore who are interested in matters concerning Singapore.

The post is more likely to appear on the newsfeeds of Singapore “friends” and “followers”.

The post was prominently featured at the top of Leong's Facebook profile page “timeline” and would have continued to remain there had it not been taken down.

The use of Facebook by Leong as a medium to share the post and article is also a factor in this trial.

In the opening statement, it was stated that false information diffuses significantly farther, faster, deeper and more broadly than true information, and reached far more people than true information.

In particular, one study has concluded that false political news reached more than 20,000 people nearly three times faster than all other types of false news that reached 10,000 users, and it took the truth about six times as long as falsehood to reach 1,500 people.

Leong removed article 'for self-preservation', did not apologise

The opening statement argued that the statements were issued by government agencies debunking the allegations made in the post and the article did not mean that the statements complained have lost its defamatory effect.

Leong's own evidence is that he did not remove the post because he eventually accepted that the article was “fake news”, but that he did so after receiving the notification from the IMDA.

It would therefore appear that Leong removed the article out of "self-preservation, and not out of contrition".

The statement also noted that Leong was given the opportunity to apologise.

Instead, Leong refused to do so, and did the opposite by continuing to draw the attention of more and more people in Singapore to the libels.

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