CJ (then AG) Chan Sek Keong’s letter to Law Minister Jayakumar on the presence of unauthorised persons inside polling stations in 1997

October 28, 2009 by admin
Filed under Review

Text of a letter from Singapore’s attorney general to law minister S. Jayakumar on the presence of unauthorised persons inside polling stations. The minister summarised the attorney general’s opinion when he replied to a query in parliament from non-constituency MP and Workers’ Party chief J. B. Jeyaretnam July 30.

[Bold and Highlighted words in red are by the Editor]

The Workers’ Party had complained to the police that Mr Goh Chok Tong, Dr Tony Tan and Brigadier-General (NS) Lee Hsien Loong had been inside a Cheng San GRC polling station on Polling Day.

But the Public Prosecutor recently advised the police that the PAP leaders had not broken the law.

21 Jul 97

Prof S Jayakumar
Minister for Law

PRESENCE OF UNAUTHORISED PERSONS INSIDE POLLING STATIONS

On 14 July 1997, THE Workers’ Party issued a press release expressing “amazement” that the public prosecutor had advised police that no offence was disclosed in the reports made by it leaders against the prime minister, the two deputy prime ministers and Dr S Vasoo that they had been present inside polling stations when they were not candidates for the relevant constituencies. The Workers’ Party queried why such conduct was not an offence under paragraph (d) or (e) of section 82(1) of the Parliamentary Elections Act.

2. On 15 July 1997, the Singapore Democratic Party also called on the attorney general to explain his “truly befuddling” decision and to state clearly if it was an offence for unauthorised persons to enter polling stations.

3. You have asked me for my formal opinion on the question raised in these two statements. My opinion is set out below.

Opinion

4. The question is whether it is an offence under the Parliamentary Elections Act for an unauthorised person to enter and be present in a polling station.

5. For this purpose, the authorised persons are the candidates, the polling agent or agents of each candidate, the Returning Officer, and persons authorised in writing by the returning officer, the police officers on duty and other persons officially employed at the polling station; see section 39 (4) of the Act (quoted below)

Activities Outside Polling Stations

6. The relevant sections of the Parliamentary Elections Act to be considered are sections 82 (1)(d) and 82 (1)(e). These provisions were enacted m 1959 pursuant to the Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Corrupt, Illegal or Undesirable Practices at Elections, Cmd 7 of 1968 (hereinafter called “the Elias Report)”

7. Section 82 (1)(d) provides that – “No person shall wait outside any polling station on polling day, except for the purpose of gaining entry to the polling station to cast his vote”.

8. Plainly, persons found waiting inside the polling stations do not come within the ambit of this section. Similarly, those who enter or have entered the polling station cannot be said to be waiting outside it. Only those who wait outside the polling station commit an offence under this section unless they are waiting to enter the polling station to cast their votes.

9. Section 82 (1)(e) provides that -

“No person shall loiter in any street or public place within a radius of 200 metres of any polling station on polling day.”

10. The relevant question is whether any person who is inside a polling station can be sad to be “within a radius of 200 metres of any polling station”. The answer to this question will also answer any question on loitering inside a polling station.

11. Plainly, a person inside a polling station cannot be said to be within a radius of 200 metres of a polling station. A polling station must have adequate space for the voting to be carried out. Any space has a perimeter. The words “within a radius of 200 metres” ‘ therefore mean “200 metres from the perimeter of” any polling station. This point is illustrated in the diagrams in the Appendix. (Editor’s note: Diagrams not available).

12. The above interpretation is fortified by the context of the provision. The polling station, as a place, is distinguished from a street or public place. It is not a street or a public place. Hence, being inside a polling station cannot amount to being in a street or in a public place. By parity of reasoning, loitering in a street or public place cannot possibly include loitering in the polling station itself and vice versa.

13. There is no ambiguity in section 82 (1)(e). If the legislature had intended to make it an offence for unauthorised persons to wait or loiter inside a polling station, it could have easily provided for it. It did not. The mischief that section 82 (1)(e) is intended to address is found in paragraph 99 of the Elias Report. It reads:

“In order to prevent voters being made subject to my form of undue influence or harassment at the approaches to polling stations, we recommend that it should be made an offence for any person to establish any desk or table near the entrance to any polling station, or to wait outside any polling station on polling day except for the purpose of gaining entry into the polling station to cast his vote; and that it should be an offence for any person to loiter in any street or public place within a radius of 200 yards of any polling station on polling day .”

14 . Paragraph 99 of the Elias Report appears under the heading “Activity OUTSIDE POLLING STATIONS”. The Commission of Inquiry was addressing the possibility of voters being subject to undue influence and harassment as they approach the polling stations. There is therefore no doubt whatever that this provision was never intended to cover any activity inside the polling station as there would be officials and election agents in attendance.

15. The legislative history makes the provision so clear that it is not even necessary to consider the application of an established principle of interpretation that any ambiguity in a penal provision should, whenever possible, be resolved favour of the accused.

Activities Inside Polling Stations

16 Activities inside polling stations were made subject to a different regime under the Act. Section 39(4) provides that -

“the presiding officer shall keep order in his station and shall regulate the number of voters to be admitted a time, and shall exclude all other persons except the polling agent or agents of each candidate, the Returning Officer and persons authorised in writing by the Returning Officer, the police officers on duty and other persons officially employed at the polling station.”

17. Under section 39(7), any person who misconducts himself in the polling station, or fails to obey the lawful orders of the presiding officer may be removed from the polling station by a police officer acting under the orders of the presiding officer. If an unauthorised person refuses to leave the polling station when told to do so by the public officer, he commits an offence under section 186 of the Penal Code for obstructing a public servant in the discharge of his duty.

18. There is a consistency in the rationales of the regulatory schemes governing activities inside and those outside polling stations on election day. Waiting outside a polling station is made an offence because it gives rise to opportunities to influence or intimidate voters: see paragraph 99 of the Elias Report. Hence, the Act has provided a safety zone which stretches outwards for 200 metres from the polling station. In contrast, the possibility of a person inside a polling station influencing or intimidating voters in the presence of the presiding officer and his officials, the polling agents etc was considered so remote that it was discounted by the Act.

19. I therefore confirm my opinion that the Parliamentary Elections Act does not provide for any offence of unauthorised entry into or presence within a polling station. Accordingly, those unauthorised persons who only wait or loiter inside a polling station on polling day do not commit any offence under the Act.

20. You are at liberty to publish this opinion.

Signed:

Chan Sek Keong
Attorney General

Source: Singapore Window

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Comments

26 Comments on "CJ (then AG) Chan Sek Keong’s letter to Law Minister Jayakumar on the presence of unauthorised persons inside polling stations in 1997"

Steve Wu on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:09 pm

Chan Sek Keong was the AG when he wrote this letter. The letter contains utter nonsense from the point of view of both logic and language.

Where was the judiciary then which upheld the Constitution and the rule of law that Chan Sek Keong CJ speaks fondly about now?

forgetilah on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:16 pm

so means next time after i have voted (provided not a walkover again), i can loiter INSIDE the polling station lah?

if cannot loiter outside, means also cannot loiter inside what. how come these elites no common sense one? or only the commoners have common sense. piang!

AlexTheGreat on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:26 pm

Join PAP and you’ll be able to teleport.

Anonymous Coward on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:31 pm

This letter is a damning letter to the judiciary and the rule of law. As many would have pointed out, to be IN the station, you would first have to be within 200meters of the polling station.

Mr Kangaroo on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:35 pm

Absolutely concur with Steve Wu.

citizenofSG on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 5:56 pm

Good job son, you are so smart, you are now the chief judge. Congrats!

x12831 on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 6:09 pm

The letter by the AG is absolute BS! The ruling elites are treating Singaporeans as idiots!

Anomymous on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 9:52 pm

So that was how the Attorney General interpreted the Rule of Law then ? And he later went on to become the Chief Justice ?

No wonder the current Attorney General is working so hard on it now.

Good grief.

Anonymous on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 11:13 pm

Does anyone get the stupidity of the AG?

To bloody loiter INSIDE the polling station, didn’t they have to WALK into the polling station first, thereby being “within the 200m radius” first….

This is of course unless:

1. The ministers had camped there before voting started the night before, and only left after voting ended that night.

2. They used Scotty to beam them in.

Protoss on Wed, 28th Oct 2009 11:20 pm

goodness gracious.

does this mean its legal for anyone to loiter inside a polling station? ouch.

idunbelieveit on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 12:07 am

“In contrast, the possibility of a person inside a polling station influencing or intimidating voters in the presence of the presiding officer and his officials, the polling agents etc was considered so remote that it was discounted by the Act.”

If they were not trying to influence or intimidate voters, what the heck were they doing in the polling station??!!?!

Everyone knows the truth, but I can’t stand the fact that they’re taking Singaporeans as fools and making a complete mockery of the judiciary system!!!

Marc on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 12:45 am

If I remember correctly, some “interesting” developments soon took place after the Attorney General’s feat of interpretation.

One chap (can’t remember his name) made some comments online to the effect that since AG said such behaviour was OK and legal, then ordinary, law-abiding Singaporeans should follow the example of their govt leaders and enter into polling stations.

He was assuming that there would be no double standards. Unfortunately for him, there WERE double standards.

Can’t remember the details of what happened to him – probably arrested/interrogated by police; or charged in court; or jailed(?).

Anyone here remember the details?

Exposer on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 12:47 am

“If they were not trying to influence or intimidate voters, what the heck were they doing in the polling station??!!?!”

Please be understanding. They could be looking for toilet, and end up finding one in the polling station. Their toilet paper ? Smearing their backside shit with voting paper that vote for opp party may just be the best exhilarating shitting experience they have in their lifetime !

Zhaozun on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 7:09 am

Stinking! Stinking! Stinking!

Vote to stop the stench!

BilaLila on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 8:32 am

It is plainly simple. If you are within 200 metres of a toilet, you can flush it easily. However , if you are in the toilet you may have difficulty flushing it.

cst on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 8:57 am

Waterwoon,samugan n csk all well placed, how to win?

btan on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 10:47 am

I don’t think many people catch this. It is IMPLIED that anyone can loiter inside the polling station if it gets approval by the presiding officer. I quote here again.

That means, it is the duty of the presiding officer to chase out any persons that are not supposed to be inside the station. The officer at that time failed in his/her duty and allowed the 3 PAP ministers to be there.

As such, we can only draw 3 possible conclusions.

1. The presiding officer renege on his/her duty and did not chase the 3 ministers away to maintain the polling station.

2. The presiding officer was too afraid to chase the 3 ministers away, being intimidated by their rank and station.

3. There is an unfair favouritism by the presiding officer, a representative of the elections department to allow the 3 ministers to be at the station.

So the real question is, why did the presiding officer of the polling station allow the 3 ministers to loiter at the station?

This is a question we need answers from.

A Tan on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 11:00 am

Ministers did not break any law because polling officer did not ask them to leave.

As usual JBJ asked the wrong question. He shld have asked”Why were they there?” “Why the polling officer did not ask them to leave?”

Instead he tried a technical question, and got a technical answer.

If you want to know why PAP is in power since 1959, one reason is that for of the 70s and 80s, JBJ was leading the Opposition.

He had balls of brass, but nothing in the grey matter area. I respect him for former but not for the latter. KJ seems to have both.

George on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 12:41 pm

I hope those 200 laywers from New York USA are reading this!!!

They can then better JUDGE the man and his words to them the other day!!!

I just hope some of them would publicly ask him to explain his words. But then again I wonder if they are already compromised in some way and would rather see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil.

And so... CJ and ex-AG... WROTE & SAID... THAT... on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 1:53 pm

Those HIGH-PROFILE and ‘time self-honoured’ dignitaries from a ‘dissolved’ parliament at GE time were right and okay to “loiter” in the polling stations???… LLLOOOLLL… AT THE following and especially the “l” word!!!…

“Accordingly, those unauthorised persons who only wait or loiter inside a polling station on polling day do not commit any offence under the Act.”…

SEE THE WORKING OF ABSOLUTE POWER DOIN ITS ‘ABSOLUTE’ thing!!!

cy on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 2:00 pm

no wonder lawyers are paid so highly,to answer a simple question, they write an essay

nonsense logic on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 3:09 pm

That presupposes that the presiding officer and his officials will have the guts to stand up to the likes of Goh Chok Tong, Tony Tan and Lee Hsien Loong. Does anyone believe that?

Cheese on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 3:50 pm

It is an offence, if you are an illegal hawker selling food within 200 metres radius of Ministry of Environment building.

But if you sell food illegally inside the Ministry of Environment building then it is not an offence because the chance of you selling to a member of public is considered so remote that it was discounted as an offence.

cat on Thu, 29th Oct 2009 4:22 pm