Here's a timeline of Pritam Singh's appeal hearing for lying under oath to parliament

Leader of the Opposition and Workers' Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh is set to have his appeal hearing today (Nov. 4) after being convicted on two charges of lying under oath to a parliamentary committee, and handed a maximum fine of S$7,000 for each charge.

Watch this space as we bring you live updates from the Supreme Court.

4:30pm: Singh leaves the court

Singh was seen leaving the Supreme Court alone.

@mothershipsg Information on the decision will be revealed at a later date. #sgnews ♬ original sound - Mothership

Speaking to the media, he said: "Let's allow the court to review the submissions and the arguments that were made by the defence and, of course, the prosecution."

"I'll only be able to really comment after judgment is given."

4:19pm: Adjourned to a later date

The hearing has been adjourned.

The judge said the court has reserved judgment and parties will be informed when the judgment is ready.

Information on the hearing will be revealed at a later date.

4:15pm: Defence's closing statements

Jumabhoy had five points to make in his brief reply.

He added that it doesn't matter what Raeesah thinks, but what Singh intended, in relation to the second charge.

3:54pm: Prosecution calls to dismiss the appeal

The prosecution concluded their submissions, asking the judge to dismiss the appeal.

Jumabhoy stands up to give his reply, to which the judge asks: "Brief reply?”

"I intend to give a very brief reply. I understand your honour has been very patient,” Jumabhoy replied.

3:45pm: Five key pieces of corroborative evidence that support Raeesah’s account

The prosecution is going through five pieces of evidence that corroborate Raeesah’s account.

"I see you like the number five," the judge noted.

"I do, your honour, it's just there's so (much) corroborative evidence in this case," the prosecutor replied.

One of the points includes WP Sylvia Lim’s notes regarding the disciplinary hearing, where she had written that Singh had told Raeesah that it was “your call” what to do about the lie.

This corroborated with Raeesah’s account that she was told to do so, the prosecutor posited.

But the judge said he does not see why the disciplinary hearing was relevant.

Another piece of evidence was Singh’s inaction on Oct. 4 and 5, after Raeesah repeated her lie.

However, the judge said the fact that Singh did not stand up to speak up is in itself not “remarkable” because it is not realistic to expect him to get up in parliament and call her out.

The point that the trial judge found troubling was that there was no reaction to that repetition of that lie on Oct. 4, the judge said.

The prosecution agreed.

3:20pm: "I am not a trial judge."

The defence had earlier said the phrase “I won't judge you” is too vague, but this goes against Singh's own evidence at trial that he was clear about what he was saying, the prosecutor said.

The judge interjects to suggest Jumabhoy did not mean it in this way, but that alternative interpretations can be drawn.

After the prosecutor made further references to previous court transcripts, the judge said it may not be entirely helpful to refer to that transcript, as though the prosecutor was asking the judge to make a finding.

The judge reiterated that he was not a trial judge, he suggested that the prosecution should refer to what the trial judge found and show how the district judge's findings are supported by the evidence.

The prosecutor clarified that he was merely showing him the evidence upon which the district judge had made the findings.

The judge asked if the defence indeed made the submission that “I will not judge you” is too vague.

Prosecution pointed to evidence, and the judge said he stands corrected, but doesn't recall the district judge making a finding on this point.

At this point, Jumabhoy is seen in discussion with Eng.

2:55pm: Prosecution’s submission

The prosecutor gave his submissions, bringing forth eight instances of inconsistent and incoherent testimony from Singh.

He gave an example of whether Singh had said “it was your call” to Raeesah.

Jumabhoy was seen frowning as he looked though the list of eight instances given by the prosecution.

However, the judge said a general submission attacking Singh’s credibility "in a vacuum" was not appealing or useful.

He told the prosecution to reframe their submission, “instead of saying he lied on eight occasions so everything he said is a lie”.

The prosecution agreed.

2:15pm: Hearing resumes

Court resumed at 2:15pm, with the prosecution addressing the judge’s earlier question.

The prosecutor explained that they had phrased it as such because they believed it was the “most direct way to claim the charge” after looking at the COP testimony.

He added that Singh has never said that the charge gave him "insufficient notice" of the case he must answer.

2:04pm

Singh is seen walking back to the Supreme Court with his team.

1:45pm: Court break

During the court break, Singh was stopped by passersby who wanted to take a selfie.

@mothershipsg can't remain LOwkey #fyp #tiktoksg #sgnews ♬ original sound - Mothership

12:37pm: Judge questions prosecution

The judge questioned the phrasing of the second charge.

This charge states that Singh "wanted to convey" to Raeesah that she had to clarify that what she told parliament was a lie.

He clarified why the charge was phrased as Singh had “wanted to convey” to Raeesah.

This was different from Singh’s evidence that he had “conveyed to her”, not “wanted to convey”.

The prosecution will address this at 2:15pm after a break.

After the adjournment, Singh was seen walking towards Parliament building.

12:20pm: Dealing with credibility

Jumabhoy said that it was impossible for the defence to rebuke or prove a negative.

However, he was interrupted by the judge who said that this is not about proving that Singh didn't say those words.

Jumabhoy reiterated that he was trying to make a point that there were many opportunities for Raeesah, Loh and Nathan to tell Singh that "this is what you told us to do, but they only brought it up during the COP.

He added that Loh and Nathan need to be judged in light of what they're saying and the text message. He said they added "new recollections of the Aug. 10 meeting when giving their accounts in court.

He also highlighted Raeesah's credibility, pointing to two different positions she had made in terms of why she had lied.

12pm: Five-minute stand down

Defence asked for a short stand down to clarify some points with the team.

Judge accedes to a five-minute break.

11:50am: Scrutinising more text messages

Jumabhoy brought up the text exchanges involving Raeesah and her two aides, Nathan and Loh, in particular the redactions done to the messages by Loh and Nathan.

Jumabhoy argued that the reasons given were not true, and posited that they were redacted because “they were telling her to continue the lie”.

One redacted message on Oct. 12 read: "In the first place, I think we should just not give too many details. At most apologise for not having the facts about her age accurate”.

In another message on Oct. 7, Loh had said: “You might wanna gather some cases of people willing to share their stories with you and share that instead.”

Jumabhoy said she was advising Raeesah on how to traverse a grey area, essentially not telling the truth.

The flavour of the messages, Jumabhoy said, was that they weren’t keen for Raeesah to tell the truth and were advising her on ways to avoid a confession.

11:39am: "I will not judge you"

Jumabhoy said the statement “I will not judge you” said by Singh to Raeesah on Oct. 3, a day before parliament hearing on Oct. 4, was interpreted differently from what Singh intended.

He also pointed to the COP hearing where Raeesah had acknowledged that there could be an alternative meaning of the words and and she could have misread it.

The judge pointed out that she has already doubled down on the lie on Oct. 3, and by doing so, she is acting contrary to his advice. Therefore, as Leader of the Opposition, it would be normal for Singh to call her out for it.

The judge further said that while Singh had claimed it was Raeesah's call, he had subsequently told her, “look at the choices you’ve made”.

If Singh was clear that she should come clean, there should be no choices, the judge noted.

He also said the phrase “I will not judge you” is not an uncommon expression.

One would say it in a context when someone is doing something “not quite right”, it would be strange to say that in a context if someone were doing the right thing, he noted.

Jumabhoy maintained that the phrase was said in the context of what Raeesah had already done, not what she was about to do.

11:20am: Judge reminds defence of appeal

The judge reminds the defence that this is an appeal.

He told Jumabhoy that his task is to persuade the judge that the district judge's findings was "inherently unreliable".

11:08am: What did Singh do in the eight-week period?

At one point during the hearing, the judge interjects and asked Jumabhoy: "I would like you to address the court on Singh's conduct from Aug. 8 to Oct. 3."

When Jumabhoy clarified, the judge replied that Singh did "nothing".

The judge further said that this untruth was quite a serious grey matter.

He said that one would expect that you would take action, what to say, clarify untruth.

What the judge found unusual is that it is common ground that nothing was done in the critical eight-week period: "Is it consistent with someone who wanted the truth to be clarified or someone who wanted the truth to be buried?"

Jumabhoy replied that it is consistent with Singh's position that he has maintained and explained that it involved "significant personal detriment" affecting Raeesah and the party. Singh wanted to give Raeesah time to settle herself. Therefore, Singh not taking immediate steps is consistent with his position throughout.

The judge accepted that Singh would be sensitive, considering Raeesah admitted to being sexually assaulted and not to harass her consistently. However, he pointed out that there was a "complete absence of any discussion".

10:49am: "Taking it to the grave"

The defence began by delving back into statements made by Raeesah which they believed pointed to inconsistencies.

Raeesah gave three different versions of what was said in the meeting with WP leaders and her discussing her lies — to the COP and at trial — in particular, Jumabhoy said she did not mention about "taking it to the grave" in one of her accounts.

Jumabhoy also pointed to Raeesah's text messages with her former WP cadres Yudhishthra Nathan and Loh Pei Ying.

10:10am: What did the words mean?

Jumabhoy said he will focus on the “main factual departures” made in August 2021 and October 2021.

The first statement is when Singh allegedly asked for Raeesah to “take it to the grave”, which the judge said was a “grave statement”. Singh has denied saying this.

The second statement is when Singh told Raeesah “I would not judge you”.

The judge questioned what those words meant, if she wasn’t going to be judged for maintaining the narrative or for taking ownership of the false anecdote.

Jumabhoy said Singh meant he would not judge Raeesah for taking responsibility for her lie.

10am

Justice of the Court of Appeal, Steven Chong, walks into the courtroom.

The courtroom doors are closed.

9:45am

The prosecution, including Deputy-Attorney General Goh Yihan are in the courtroom.

Jumabhoy shakes hands with the prosecution team.

9:40am

Around 20 members of the public are seated in the public gallery so far.

Singh's father, Amarjit Singh, a former deputy public prosecutor and district judge, was seen at the public gallery as well.

9:33am

Around 20 people, mostly from the media, were waiting outside the Supreme Court for Singh's arrival.

He walked into the Supreme Court along with his lawyers, Andre Jumabhoy and Aristotle Eng.

When members of the media asked how he was feeling, he said: "Same way I feel every morning, which is great."

@mothershipsgPritam Singh and his lawyers arrived at Supreme Court by 9:45am. He's set to appeal against his conviction and sentence. #sgnews♬ original sound - Mothership

Background

Singh went on trial for two charges relating to what he told the COP, which was set up to look into former WP Member of Parliament (MP) Raeesah Khan and her untruth in parliament.

On Feb. 17, the judge convicted Singh on both charges under the Parliament (Privileges, Immunities and Powers) Act.

The first is for claiming that he wanted Raeesah to clarify her lie in parliament at some point.

The second is for telling the Committee of Privileges that he had advised Raeesah to come clean in parliament.

The judge found Singh guilty of falsely testifying to the COP that when he spoke to Raeesah on Oct. 3, 2021, he wanted her to admit to having lied to parliament on Aug. 3, 2021, about having accompanied a rape victim to a police station, if this issue were to come up in parliament on Oct 4, 2021.

Top image by Azrizal Abu Che'