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The Workers' Party's (WP) leaders have demonstrated an 'opportunistic and cavalier' attitude towards the truth, in deciding whether their former member Raeesah Khan should own up, and the manner in which she should have done it, PAP Member of Parliament (MP) Sim Ann said.

The Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs and National Development was speaking in Mandarin in Parliament, at the debate on the Committee of Privileges' (COP) recommendations.

Sim elaborated that WP appeared to be leaning towards a path where the truth is "opportunistically and cynically" distorted to inflame emotions, all for the sake of winning more support and votes.

Sim: WP tried their luck with a "wait and see" approach

The minister noted that when the WP leaders came to know about Raeesah's lie, they did not "cause" her to clarify immediately and proactively.

"They tried their luck with a ‘wait and see’ approach. If the matter was not brought up, Ms Khan was to 'take the information to the grave,'" she said.

The WP leaders also guided Raeesah to maintain her original narrative, resulting in her doubling down on the untruth in Parliament on Oct. 4, thereby compounding her initial offence, Sim added.

"The WP then arranged for Ms Khan to assume full responsibility for both occasions where she lied, on 1 Nov, while obscuring the WP leaders’ role in guiding her."

Sim also said that "clear conflicts of interest" were present at the discipline panel the WP convened on Nov. 2, given that they withheld from its Central Executive Committee (CEC) the fact that they had already known about Raeesah's lies, and the guidance that had been given to her.

The blame for doubling down was therefore pushed onto Raeesah alone, resulting in the CEC's decision for Raeesah to either resign or be expelled.

Sim: Performance of WP leaders before COP was "even more chilling"

Sim then addressed the behaviour of the WP leaders before the COP, highlighting that their performance was "even more chilling."

She noted that Singh in particular had attempted to minimise the impact of Raeesah's lie on the police.

"His view was that the police was not a 'broken-back' organisation, implying that it was therefore all right to make false allegations on them," she said.

In addition, Singh also claimed that he had not required Raeesah to clarify the truth as he wanted her to have more time to inform her parents of her sexual assault, Sim added.

Sim said that this was an "incredible" excuse given that Singh did not follow up to see if this action had indeed been done.

She also alleged:

"The WP leaders also suggested that Ms Khan might be mentally unstable, and possibly more prone to lying due to her experience and this was proven to be baseless by a mental health professional."

As such, on the whole, the COP found that Singh had lied under oath, she added.

Sim also noted that Faisal was in contempt of Parliament by refusing to answer the COP's questions.

"These are all possible criminal offences," she said.

People have been hurt by the 'machinations' of the WP leaders

This led to Sim's following point that there were people who had been hurt by the "machinations" of the WP leaders.

According to Sim, the victims were Raeesah herself, who lost her party membership and parliamentary seat and the WP as a whole and its supporters,

Here, Sim said,"You only need to read the statements by party cadres Ms Loh Pei Ying and Mr Yudishthra Nathan to feel their pain."

Sim also said that Parliament's prestige had been undermined by the WP leaders' "scant regard" for the institution's dignity and credibility.

Also, Sim claimed that the statements made by the WP leaders hurt victims of sexual assault and mental health patients and reinforced" the prejudices that such a group already faced.

However, in his speech earlier in the debate, Singh said:

"I reject this assertion that in raising the matter of Ms Khan’s mental health to a fact-finding body with a view to considering an appropriate punishment on her, I had somehow smeared her, or worse, somehow cast aspersions on those with mental health conditions."

Harm to Singapore's political ecosystem: Sim Ann

Sim also said that harm had been done to Singapore's political ecosystem.

Reiterating that condoning lies being cavalier with the truth undermined the "foundation of honesty and trust" that Singapore's democracy is built on, she said:

"To exploit the public’s sympathy for the underdog and paint the COP as being politically motivated, not only distracts the public from the core issue, but seeks to numb the public to lies and dishonesty."

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