Syariah Court, Inter alia

Okay, my lawyer actually brought me to Syariah Court for a Pre-Trial Conference (hereafter “PTC”)! Upon receiving the invite yesterday at approximately 3.30pm, I proceeded to plan to get a white long sleeved shirt and full black pants to wear for court (even though it was only a PTC). I felt excited because I finally actually get to see another glimpse of a life of a lawyer, fighting it out for your clients. The case itself was interesting in some aspects and was not the usual divorce case since the husband has a criminal record and the husband has not jatuh talak to his wife yet so technically they are still married.

Just to back track, yesterday (or shall I say Tuesday) was a mad rush after work to get the perfect set of clothes for my first day in court for a actual case (rather than simply going to send some documents to the Probate Counter at the Subordinate Courts)! In the end I decided to get the ones from G2000 since it was the best deal in Tampines Mall and Century Square combined! The white long sleeved shirt was $39/- and the black pants was $29.40 after 40% discount. Thanks to Fatma for accompanying me around both malls to survey and get the perfect set and her advise on the rule to only wear 5 accessories for suits (though I personally do not feel a need in the near future to dress so well if I’m only a lowly law student.. heeheehee)

One of the lawyers warned me that Syariah Court was quite informal and recountered an experience in which the judge actually proceeded to cross examine the Plaintiff from where he was sitting and not in the stand and under oath. But though I never went to an actual trial, what I realised that it was informal but in a positive way in the sense that there is a strong sense of community among the lawyers and even the clerks in the Syariah Court. Though the number of Malay speaking Indian Muslim lawyers outnumber the Malay lawyers, everyone knows each other well to say Hi and lament to each other on various cases. Administrative inefficiencies aside, the clerks themselves know the lawyers personally and their dispatch clerks/workers since there are so few of them around.

Before speaking in front of the Registrar, the lawyers had to wait in what I was told was called a Bar Room which gives the lawyers a private space to relax and read up on their case before being called. And another observation that struck me was the fact that there isn’t such a thing as a stereotypical Malay lawyer. All are very different in their own quirky idiosyncratic way, from the utterly messy, to the rather calm and composed, from being motherly to being rather flirtatious in front of beautiful women! So it really depends on who you really are and how much you yourself make of the law profession that reflects your abilities as a lawyer in the court of law. And the fact that all of them are effectively bilingual inspired me to want to try to speak more Malay fluently at home and with friends to help myself achieve more being a Malay lawyer (if I do so in the future…)

Overall, it was thoroughly an eye opening experience. Though some lessons to be learnt – I need to get rid of my juvenile looking Blue Billabong wallet. Though it served its purpose in JC and army, it does not belong in the hands of a lawyer! (as most people got the impression when I was wearing the suit and tie in the court building) And this also includes my “I don’t discriminate, I hate everyone!” sling bag (or handbag as Vasaant adamantly reminds me!) which totally did not go with the suit. And I need to buy a suit (since I borrowed the one I wore from another lawyer), dress shoes, tie and belt so that I am ready in case he asks me to go along again!

And guess what? He asked me if I wanted to go to prison today and I said yes! Hahahahahaha. My lawyer is a fantastic guy for someone who is willing to teach someone who knows so little of the law. I am in total gratitude to him and I hope I can learn more from him in the next two days. By the way, I’m actually working with another firm (though in the same office) for another lawyer since his secretary is currently on marital leave. So far, secretarial work has been good. Even if I’m not learning about being a lawyer itself, I do get to handle court documents and is exposed to the things the secretary has to go through in order for lawyer to do his job effectively. I really appreciate all the help my fellow collegues have given me as I grapple which how to proceed with the Interlocutory Judgment to confirm liability in a personal injury claim or who should sign the Consent To Dispense Sureties in the list of beneficiaries of the estate. It has been fun and exciting and irritating at times!

Okay parents going off to perform Ibadah Haji tomorrow! Wishing them a safe journey ahead!

There is a First for Everything…

Today was the first day I entered a Court Building (not the court itself!). Today was also the first day that I was invited to go for dinner with my lawyer and all of the other lawyers and secretaries in the office. Today was also the first and only time that I had to puke during a meal. And last but not least, I also got personally invited for a Malay wedding that is not at all affiliated to my parents!

There’s always a first for everything. As some of my friends already know, I have been working in a law firm for about two months already. And it has been such a refreshing change from the regimentation and discipline of the army! And it has actually come to an extent that I self impose such discipline and regimentation on my lawyer and his office, with my ever obsessive compulsive desire to keep things neat and tidy and on stand by conditions, even during the day when I leave for lunch! I actually cleaned his whole office, making it workable for once! Since I am employed as a secretary/admin assistant/clerk, I don’t expect to really understudy him and learn the mechanics of law and go to court. So when some documents had to be personally delivered to the Subordinate Courts and when the dispatch rider was on MC, the onus was on me to go with him (since I can’t drive!) So yes, the first time I actually went to court was to send documents to the Probate counter. Not entirely spectacular but its a start, given my initial ambivalence to the law profession itself.

Today was also the first time that I participated in a social event with the rest of the people in the office. I have to clarify that there are three separate law firms with three separate lawyers and secretaries working in the same office, so including me that makes seven of us. It was hard initially when I did not know them well so as I worked and proved my worth to them, even though I am only a temp, I was still invited to go with the rest of them. (Though traditional Malay courtesy would prove otherwise, that I still would go regardless of whether I was only a temp!) And it was fantastic, meeting and talking to them on a social setting since its difficult once we are in our offices and immersed in doing documents and paperwork. And I actually managed to talk to the other two lawyers and gain much insight on the law profession itself, especially with regards to being a Malay lawyer.

And this was definitely the first time I vomitted during the meal. And no, I did not vomit on the table. (Thank Allah!) I vomitted in the toilet! I knew that eating at a table barbeque restaurant which mainly consisted or burnt or undercooked food was not good for my sensitive stomach so when I was on to dessert, I already felt queasy and nauseous. One of the lawyers even commented that I was eating too little but the truth is, I was simply feeling sick and the smell was making it worse! So yup I vomitted in the toilet without their knowledge and nonchalantly went back to my seat. Note to self: Never ever again eat at Seoul Garden or Hans River or any other table barbeque restaurant. There’s a reason why you swore off Seoul Garden since Secondary school. No more overpriced undercooked/burnt food for you!

And I was also invited to my first Majlis Persandingan or wedding! One of the female secretaries was getiing married this december and I’m invited! It feels good in the sense that on one hand, she feels close enough to me to invite me to her wedding and that I’m also old enough to actually receive an invitation! I’m definitely going, just that I will going alone since the rest of them are married and have children. So yup, my first wedding invitation no vaguely associated to my family!

So yup, the first of many firsts. Just that today was exceptionally more special with my vomit-in-toilet in mind. Hehehehe. Never ever shall I go to any table barbeque restaurant. NEVER.

These maids sleep on mats outside the house

Loh Chee Kong
cheekong@newstoday.com.sg

Dr David Tio has witnessed a disturbing sight for the past two weeks, walking past his neighbour’s house on his way home: A group of maids lying huddled on the cemented backyard, sleeping on thin mattresses, mats and newspapers underneath the zinc roofs.

His neighbour’s HDB terrace house in the Whampoa area is situated next to a raised pavement and a multi-storey car park. Passers-by get a clear view of the maids sleeping in the backyard.

Said Dr Tio: “This is no way to treat fellow human beings. How can you make the maids sleep outside? Besides the discomfort, there’s no privacy at all.”

Today visited the double-storey house four times over the past week in the wee hours of the morning. About six maids were sleeping outside the house on two occasions.

When approached by Today, the owners of the house, who have been running a maid agency for 13 years, claimed that the arrangement was only “temporary” until a new boarding house is ready this week. The wife, who employs a maid of her own, claimed that “under no circumstances” had the maids slept a whole night out in the open.

The bespectacled, middle-aged woman claimed the maids had “only rested outside on not more than two occasions” as there were visitors in the house and it was “inconvenient”. After the visitors left, she said, the foreign domestic workers would go up to the room — one of three bedrooms in the house — of the couple’s maid to sleep.

But on one of the nights that Today witnessed the maids sleeping in the backyard, there were clearly no guests in the house as the lights were already out.

The maids spend their day at the employment agency’s office and only return to the house at around 9pm to sleep.

Telling her neighbours to mind their own business, the wife told Today in Mandarin: “We run a reputable agency and of course, we know how we should treat our maids … Would we be in the business for so long if we ill-treated them?”

The couple’s maid, who has been working for them for 14 months, said that her employers were “nice” to her. Speaking to Today when they were out, she said: “They treat me very well but I wouldn’t know how they treat others.”

When contacted, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) said it would investigate the matter. From June last year, all maid employment agencies were required to adhere to best practices — which include guidelines on accommodation and food — and be accredited by CaseTrust and the Association of Employment Agencies Singapore. Those that fail to meet these standards risk not having their licences renewed.

Ms Braema Mathi, president of civil society group Transient Workers Count Too, said the couple’s actions were inexcusable.

She said: “Is there no space within their home to let the maids sleep in? Even if there is really none, I don’t understand why the owners didn’t have alternatives. They could have rented rooms for these maids.”

Adding that there is a “basic decency level to treat humans”, Ms Mathi said: “If this is their business model, this agency’s practices leave much to be desired.” Loh Chee Kong
cheekong@newstoday.com.sg

I read the article here.

Yesterday there was news about installing cameras around the house to keep a watch on maids because we, as employers are afraid of “maids gone wild” (I saw them trying on mam’s clothes while she was out! She brought home her Bangladeshi boyfriend home! She totally manhandled my child!) And today we have this.

What is the world coming to?! What are Singaporeans coming to?! The way to measure one’s character is how we treat the people under us. If we treat them like crap, who are we then to say that we have progressed as a society? More needs to be done on this issue! What are you all doing ah, Gahmen!

The banality of sedition

October 15, 2005
Letter:
John A. Tessensohn
Osaka, Japan

THE seditionists’ flimsy mea exculpa in Convicted for sedition, blogger insists: ‘I’m no racist’ (Today, Oct 8-9) is disquieting because this incident shows how blogs have denatured and desensitized admittedly “normal persons” like Koh, Lim and the rest of his ilk from the dangerously volatile issue like race relations in Singapore. By his own description in the Today report, Koh said he “blasted away” on his blog and even engaged in “another blog war” that resulted from his earlier entries – strong fighting words that are easily recognizable by legions of sedentary keyboard warriors who dwell in a nether world of trolls, lurkers, noobs, rotflmao, flame throwers and other denizens in planet blogopolis.

The causus belli of his blogging racist tirades? He was offended by the consternation displayed by a group of Malay picnickers after he had walked his dogs too close for their comfort at East Coast Park.

Admittedly, the very nature of blogging with its unfiltered expression and publication online almost as instantly as a thought strikes makes some of these blogs engrossing and edgy reading. But while this quick-trigger sensation is sauce of the blogging goose, it is now sedition for the real world gander, especially when it comes to race relations in Singapore.

All racist rants are clearly more dangerous than entertaining blogging, for example, about what color underwear a lingerie model may have laid out for herself that morning, but I digress. Words in blogs are published and put out there for the world to read and react to.

By Koh’s own admission, he counts on having Malay friends, one even showed up in a gesture of comradeship at his hearing. But Koh flatters to deceive because Koh and Lim would not be sitting in a cold, dank prison cell today if he had been equally conscientious to ask his many Malay friends’ opinions about the wisdom or propriety of publishing online the contents of his racially offensive blogs.

Such is the banality of these bloggers’ strain of racism. Koh et. al. , like many other Singaporeans would most likely have friends of different races, and are not your archetypical, mouth-frothing, right-wing racist fanatics. But racism inherently dehumanizes and debases the individual and refocuses some irrational rage onto an abstracted target of hate.

One’s friends are never part of that group that is scurrilously targeted because of its race, even though they are members of that race. People, in their worser states, can probably think or compose such vile and hateful racist thoughts, but before the advent of the blog, such thoughts should not be hastily published, for the entire online world to read and dwell upon, by easily as pressing an ENTER button. The liberating and empowering faux authority of blog publications can amplify such baser impulses and cause mayhem.

The blogger may be liberated by the medium but is a willing captive of the machine. The blogger minimizes contact with the multifaceted human dynamic, flesh and blood-based interaction and is certainly more at ease with a no-contact, non-tactile reductivist exercise in self-gratification – a supreme master or mistress of their domain. One clearly knows if one engages in too much self-gratification, the physiological and psychological consequences are not for the faint hearted.

For the record, I am not asking the Singapore government to ban blogs or the Internet (they must have either seriously considered the feasibility or are currently secretly planning to do so as I write this). But using the Sedition Act to police and regulate such blogs could be akin using a cangkul (hoe) to crush a kacang putih (peanut) – typical of the Singaporean instinct to law and order – just like to a dog, everything looks like a fire hydrant.

A more enlightened approach would have been that in addition to short and sharp imprisonment for such offenses, community service by the offender at the many self-help groups like MENDAKI or SINDA could help sensitize first time offenders like Koh and Lim.

In schools, students should be encouraged to volunteer time at such self-help groups, and that how and who can contribute to such organizations are not solely based by their color of their skin or their article of faith.

While I am loathe to praise the Singapore government for its over-efficient curtailing of the precious few liberties that Singaporeans can still indulge in, this enforcement action was a long time coming. A jail sentence sends a strong deterrent warning to those that have played with the fire of racism, deserved to get burnt, but a more nuanced approach to promote race relations against such offenders and other Singaporeans need to be applied.

I saw this article in the Singapore Window. I felt it sums up the whole issue of the racist bloggers very well, dealing with the disgusting racist diatribe of some who are not your “archetypical, mouth-frothing, right-wing racist fanatics” while at the same time, highlighting the “over-efficient” (I love this word! Its so true of the Singapore government..) enforcement of the Sedition Act which may not be the best long term solution to the problem.

On a related note, when I was talking to my elder brother about the issue, he actually had received a forwarded email containing such racial slurs. And I asked him to send it to me for me to take a closer look. And boy was I truly surprised! Believe me, it was VERY VERY VERY vile and disgusting! I’m simply shocked at the level of stupidity and narrow-mindedness such people are. And the fact is such people do exist among our midst. Argh. Leads me to question to what extent our education system, housing system, racial harmony day etc has been successful…

Restriction on Freedom of Expression

05 August 2005

by Sinapan Samydorai

There are still many restrictive laws which limit the rights to freedom of expression, association and assembly. On 22 August 2004, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, made his first National Day Rally speech, calling for a more open and inclusive society. In Singapore, there are still many restrictive laws which limit the rights to freedom of expression, association and assembly.

Constitutional Rights to Freedom of Speech, Assembly & Association includes freedom of speech and expression, freedom to assemble peacefully and without arms, and freedom to form association. At the Speakers Corner, citizens are free to speak. But the Speech must not be inflammatory towards any race, religion, and/or against the interest of national security and public order.

Various restrictions are enforced by legislations and rules such as:
Sedition Act
Undesirable Publications Act
Newspaper and Printing Presses Act
Penal Code
Internal Security Act
Public entertainment Act
Trade Unions Act
Societies Act
Mutual Benefit Organization Act
Rules and regulations on Speakers Corner

The laws state any gathering of 5 persons in a “public place”, could be considered by the authorities as an illegal assembly. Even indoors meetings face the same restrictions. The Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act, section 5 (1): “The Minister may make rules: (a) regulating assemblies and processions in public roads, public places and places of public resort…”

29 July 2005: The minister made following rule “Under the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) (Assemblies and Procession) Rules 1989, a permit is required for any assembly or procession of 5 or more persons in any public road, public place or place of public resort intended: (a) to demonstrate support for or opposition to the views or actions of any person;
(b) to publicise a cause or campaign;or
(c) to mark or commemorate any event.”

The Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act defines “public place” as: “Any place or premises to which at the material time the public or any section of the public has access, on payment or otherwise, as of right or by virtue of express or implied permission.”

The Public Entertainments and Meetings Act: “No public entertainment shall be provided except:
(a) in an approved place; and
(b) in accordance with a licence issued by the Licensing Officer.”

The Schedule appended to the Act, defines “public entertainment,” inter alia, “(m) any lecture, talk, address, debate or discussion;”

To speak one needs a Public Entertainment Licence. To invite more than 4 persons, Police Permit is required, issued pursuant to the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act.

In Think Centre’s experience, when the Public Entertainment Licence Unit issues the license the gathering is considered a legal assembly.

The Prime Minister at the 2004 National Day Rally Speech said: “… for indoor talks, we are going to do away with licensing. Right now, if you are going outdoors or indoors, if you want to do a talk you need a public entertainment licence. Usually it’s approved. It’s not a problem. But once in a while… you are slow or the police have reservations, they say ‘no’. But it’s very rare. So now we’ve decided we are going to exempt indoor talks from licensing requirements unless they touch on sensitive issues like race and religion.”

28 August 2004, the Straits Times reported the police “refinements to licensing requirements”, for a lecture, discussion or debate to qualify for exemption from licensing as:
* Only Singaporeans can speak, no foreigners;
* Must steer clear of issues related to race or religion;
* Must be in the four official languages or related dialects;
* Must be in an enclosed space “and which is not within the hearing or view of any person who is not attending or participating”.

Think Centre had organized a number of indoor forums without any need for licences. But in May 2005, Think Centre had to obtain a licences for a “vigil” against the death penalty held at the Furama Hotel [indoor gathering].

At present laws require permit for any assembly or procession of 5 or more persons in any public road, public place or place of public resort.This is too restrictive. Think Centre hopes that the government will allow gatherings of 20 or less persons without the need for permits.