Friday, March 26, 2010

Davinder Singh, Lee Kuan Yew's lawyer should not be allowed to escape his wrongdoing.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Davinder Singh of the firm of Drew and Napier of Singapore has blood in his hands. Since his admission to the Singapore Bar in 1982, he has represented Lee Kuan Yew and his family in a shameful long career of misusing the law to bankrupt impoverish and imprison his fellow citizens through the shameless collaboration of Singapore's corrupt judges.

JB Jeyaretnam, one of his principle victims has suffered terribly at his hands ever since Singh was admitted to the Singapore Bar, repeatedly suing Jeyaretnam where it was clear to anyone with eyes, let alone lawyers, that Jeyaretnam was innocent of any wrongdoing.

He saw to it that Jeyaretnam's licence to practice was revoked; he made sure that Jeyaretnam was repeatedly bankrupted, even jailed; he made sure that Jeyaretnam's practice was destroyed, he did all of of this for money, lots of it, thanks to his generous client, the Singapore strongman Lee Kuan Yew.

Although eventually Jeyaretnam was able to pay off these totally illegal amounts demanded of him, thereby releasing him from bankruptcy, he died soon thereafter in 2008.

I came to know of his death while I was incarcerated in a Singapore prison because of my criticism of one of Lee's judges in this blog.

Another helpless victim of this Sikh turbaned lawyer, who would do anything for Lee Kuan Yew's money, was of course Tang Liang Hong.

Tang's only crime was making a public speech, informing his audience in 1997 elections that he had lodged a police report against Lee Kuan Yew. Davinder Singh shamelessly abused the legal system and argued successfully, with the help of Lee's compliant judges, that by this act alone, Tang Liang Hong had defamed Lee Kuan Yew.

Of course that was the end for poor Tang Liang Hong in Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore.

Fearing for his life, Tang Liang Hong and his family fled to Australia. In the meantime, Singh successfully managed to freeze all of Tang's assets amounting to several millions of dollars which was promptly paid over to Lee Kuan Yew. Tang Liang Hong now lives in exile in Australia.

More recently we have the series of defamation cases against Dr. Chee Soon Juan where it is clear to anyone that Dr. Chee was merely exercising legitimate criticism of his political opponent Lee Kuan Yew. Yet Lee Kuan Yew, with the use of this lawyer, manages to successfully argue that Dr. Chee defamed Lee Kuan Yew, managed to extract several millions of dollars against him, resulting in him losing his job as a Professor in the Singapore University, promply impoverished and bankrupted.

Davinder Singh stands guilty of misusing the law for his personal gain throughout his entire career since 1982; therefore he is responsible under the criminal law for suborning the cause of justice and stands liable for punishment and imprisonment. It is a crime for someone to deliberately bend the law for personal gain, which he has clearly done repeatedly.

Davinder Singh also stands guilty of civil law under the cause of action of unjust enrichment. The law requires that when a man enriches himself in circumstances where he is not entitled to it, he is required to account for it to his victims.

Davinder Singh also stands liable under legal ethics rules for unethical conduct as a lawyer. It is unethical for a lawyer to pursue a cause of action in circumstances where he knows that it has no merit either in law or in fact. Here we have Singh arguing before the court repeatedly that JB Jeyaretnam defamed Lee Kuan Yew, that Tang Liang Hong defamed Lee Kuan Yew and that Dr. Chee Soon Juan defamed Lee Kuan Yew. He did it not just once but repeatedly; where the facts show, not only that there was no defamation, but even more importantly, he knew there was none.

Recently I had written a hoax in this blog about Lee Kuan Yew's heart attack, and you know the result of it. There was uncertainty throughout the island, there was chaos; had the hoax continued a little longer there would have been a total shutdown of Singapore. By now, the message should be clear to you. If 87 year old Lee Kuan Yew dies, which I expect to happen next week if not sooner, you will see chaos.

I expect a change in government very soon in Singapore. And the new government is not going to take kindly to these criminals such as Singh, who abuse the law under the protection of a dictator. I expect a new Singapore government to hold Davinder Singh to account for his deliberate actions to destroy and demolish his fellow Singaporeans such as JB Jeyaretnam, Tang Liang Hong and Dr. Chee Soon Juan.

I would demand criminal proceedings to be commenced against Davinder Singh under the law for subornation of justice. I would also expect legal proceedings to be brought by the victims of his crimes under civil law amounting to several millions of dollars, every penny that JB Jeyaretnam had to pay, every penny that Tang Liang Hong had to pay and every penny that Dr. Chee had to pay as well as everyone else whose rights he abused under the protection of Lee Kuan Yew.

Since Davinder Singh must be well paid by his master Lee Kuan Yew for all the dirty work he does, he should be able to cough out a fair amount towards the sums lost by his victims. In the event of his being unable to satisfy the entire debt, his law firm, Drew and Napier and every lawyer in it should be made to pay since they too are accomplices in the crimes committed by him.

With 87 year old Lee Kuan Yew's death, which I expect anytime; in any action against Singh, he would be expected to argue that he was only following the laws of Singapore and since it was the judges who decided the cases, he is not to blame.

We should tell him right now that such a defense must fail. Lee Kuan Yew through the abuse of the law and the election system managed to gain one party rule from 1959 till date thereby transforming a democratic island into a Fascist one, with Fascist laws. These laws are unjust under common law, they are not binding in a free and fair democracy.

Davinder Singh, himself very well knew these laws were illegal and unenforcible, and therefore he cannot be permitted to benefit from collaborating with an unjust system.

That is precisely why Hitler's laws never gave any defense to his criminals after his fall. Simply an unjust law is not a basis for any defence at all.

Most recently, a few days ago, Davinder Singh again misused his authority for personal gain by collecting damages of $160,000.00 for his client Lee Kuan Yew from International Herald Tribune in circumstances where, once again, there was no defamation at all.

Unlike very often in the past, I have not seen Davinder Singh's picture recently splashed accross Singapore's state controlled newspapers lately, with descriptions of "best lawyer" and such like.

Is he keeping a low profile as of late? Has it has finally dawned on him that his benefactor is indeed 87 years old? Has he has finally begun to worry about what may happen to him after his master dies?

And what is more, we have not seen Lee Kuan Yew in public lately. Perhaps he is already dead but not wanting the island to breakdown into disorder, the government is not telling us. Or perhaps he is in fact sick and had a heart attack after all.

But whatever may be the case, one thing is certain. 87 year old Lee Kuan Yew's clock is ticking. And when that happens next week if not the next, there is going to be unrest and upheaval in the island. Singaporeans are not going to simply take things quietly. I expect them to want their pound of flesh. And it would be Davinder Singh's that they would be after.

Frankly I don't think there is anything that Singh could do to save himself now. He has hurt too many innocent fellow Singaporeans to please Lee Kuan Yew for far too long. His fate is sealed. I don't think it is going to be very pleasant for him.

There is nothing I can say other than to feel sorry for him. I am sure Lee Kuan Yew who asked Singh to represent him in a shameful career of misusing the law, knew that one day Singh could find himself on the receiving end of the stick. But knowing Lee Kuan Yew demonstrably all these years, he won't have batted an eyelid if Davinder Singh was hung by the same turban around his head.

And that is why, we can all thank our stars that we are not in Davinder Singh's shoes. As the saying goes, we reap what we sow.

I am sure next week or the next, when the 87 year old Lee Kuan Yew dies, Davinder Singh with his wife and children, may try to abscond from Singapore to save himself from the clutches of his fellow angry Singaporeans. He should be stopped from leaving the island.

Gopalan Nair
39737 Paseo Padre Parkway, Suite A1
Fremont, CA 94538, USA
Tel: 510 657 6107
Fax: 510 657 6914
Email: nair.gopalan@yahoo.com
Blog: http://singaporedissident.blogspot.com/

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8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Give it 5 more months. When August comes, we will see if Lee is present at the National Day parade.

Anonymous said...

Well North Korea is still going strong . . .

I would assume Singapore would not see change too even when Harry Lee is gone.


The only people who would be left are the ones groomed under Harry regime and these people have lost idealism and noble cause to pragmatism and personal wealth.

Singapore is not Iran. The dot is just a dot very easy to control and policed. All that money that Harry Lee and family are believed to possess would make them invincible.

Sad indeed.(Let's observe a minute of silence now to give respect to the death of good intentions in Singapore). Too few . . .

@Mr Nair, I'm glad you gave a second thought on your decision to back out from blogging entirely. Blogging FOR A GOOD CAUSE is a noble intention. Keep it up. Don't let fear takes over.

Renaldi

Gopalan Nair said...

To Renaldi,

I don't think your comparison with North Korea is correct. North Korea is a closed society and completley isolated. Singapore will completly collpase when big boy dies. Finance will drain. People will leave and foreigners will flee. Singapore does not have closed borders.

Sunny said...

If you want to know, Davinder Singh is one of the product of 50 years LKY's rule of Singapore.

This singh has no MORAL at all.

Simple as that!

Anonymous said...

Easy to control? Who controls?
After the death, there will be a closed door meeting for 1 month with total confusion inside. People will not know who to listen to anymore. People with all kinds of political ambitions will start emerging from no where. Divisions will happen.

Look no further than the death of Mao. Mao's designated successor Hwa Guo Feng went down shortly after, with pockets of power coming up everywhere. The rest is history.

Anonymous said...

There will be a big stimulus package to Sinkies if LKY dies. Why? to stop chaos, stockmark collapse and people from leaving. Take $10Bil from the reserve to give Sinkies ang pows is not a bad idea.

Snoopy Jnr said...

Singapore now has to look offshore for foreign talents. The PAP government had cowed its people into a quivering mass of imbeciles.

That ghastly durian looking building at the Esplanade is an affront to the eyes but who dares criticize. They want to promote culture and arts. What a joke!

A electoral system so skewed so as to entrench PAP in power forever. Might as well drop the sham and have a one-party state like in PRC.

Carl Nunes said...

Totally agree with you. Thank you for your exceptional piece. Good job sir.
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