Kenneth Jeyaretnam slapped with 8th POFMA order, under police investigation

Minister for Transport and Second Minister for Finance Chee Hong Tat has instructed that a correction direction under the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA) be issued to Reform Party secretary-general Kenneth Jeyaretnam.

This is the eight correction direction issued to Jeyaretnam.

The POFMA office and the Singapore Police Force have started investigations for possible offences under POFMA and the Administration of Justice (Protection) Act 2016, respectively, according to a Jul. 4 press release issued by the Ministry of Finance.

The release also noted that Jeyaretnam has remained "out of jurisdiction" and has not made himself available to assist in investigations by attending any interviews, despite having been in contact with agencies since April 2024.

Facebook post about land price

Jeyaretnam's POFMA correction pertains to a Facebook post published Jun. 15, 2024.

In his Facebook post, Jeyaretnam alleged that the government artificially inflates the price of land, for sale to the Housing Development Board.

He also alleged that the government maintains a large land bank of heritage properties — such as black and white heritage bungalows — in order to keep land prices "as high as possible".

This is part of the government strategy of boosting Singapore's reserves, Jeyaretnam claimed.

"This is untrue," MOF said of both statements.

To the first allegation on inflated prices, MOF countered that the prices of state land to HDB are not set by the government, but by an independent office: the Chief Valuer, who determines the sale prices and fixed it with reference to the fair market value.

To the other allegation on the government's reserve strategy, MOF said that the government's approach to land management is based on Singapore's planning and development needs, not to maximise land sales proceeds or to boost the reserves.

MOF added that certain properties in Singapore are conserved instead of being redeveloped because of their heritage and/or historical value.

Budget and reserves

Jeyaretnam also alleged that the much of the Net Investment Returns Contribution (NIRC) — the investment returns from Singapore's reserves, that supplement the annual Budget — goes into "non-transparent endowments and trust funds".

This, he claimed, suggests that Singaporeans derive "little to no benefit" from Singapore's reserves.

"This is untrue," MOF said of the alleged non-transparency.

It clarified that top-ups to the endowment and trust funds can be found in the Revenue and Expenditure Estimates and the Supply Bill.

The amount of each top-up can also be found in various, publicly-accessible financial statements, it said.

An article published in government fact-checking site Factually also denounced that Jeyaretnam's claim about Singaporeans deriving "little to no benefit" from the reserves as "misleading".

"The NIRC has provided an annual revenue stream of about 3.5 per cent of GDP on average over the past five years," the article said.

It added that Singapore's reserves also serve as a crisis fund, such as during the Covid-19 pandemic, which saw about S$40 billion being drawn from the reserves between Financial Year 2020 and 2022, for pandemic response measures.

Jeyaretnam has received multiple Correction Directions and his website and social media platforms have been made "Declared Online Locations".

"Notwithstanding these actions, Mr Jeyaretnam has continued to make false and misleading statements about government policies and the operations of public agencies, despite publicly  available facts and having the falsehoods and their corresponding facts pointed out to him.

"He has repeatedly made false statements, even when the facts are clear and should be known to him."

Top image from Kenneth Jeyaretnam/Facebook and MOF/Facebook