Ex-Singapore minister Subramaniam Iswaran
receives 1-year prison sentence for graft
Oct. 3 (UPI) -- A former Singapore government minister was sentenced to a year in prison Thursday on corruption charges after pleading guilty to accepting gifts worth more than $300,000 including Formula 1 race and soccer match tickets, private jet travel and hotel accommodation.
The city state's High Court handed down the jail term to 62-year-old former transport minister Subramaniam Iswaran for four counts of obtaining valuable items from two local businessmen and a single count of obstructing justice by accepting the gifts ranging from big overseas ticket sports and leisure items to a folding "Brompton" bicycle and alcohol.
Another 30 charges under the same section of the penal code were taken into consideration at Thursday's sentencing hearing after Iswaran was convicted on September 24.
Iswaran was arrested in July 2023 following an investigation by the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau into his dealings between 2017 and 2022 and repayment in May 2023 of a $4,400 business class ticket from Doha to Singapore paid for by one of the businessmen that the prosecution alleged was aimed at throwing the CPIB off the scent.
Justice Vincent Hoong overrode the 7-month sentence sought by prosecutors saying that Iswaran had abused his power and damaged public faith in the government, referring to the battering the reputation of the ruling People's Action Party has taken from the scandal.
Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said he was "saddened and disappointed" at the way the career of the 25-year veteran of parliament and Communications Minister and Trade and Industry minister had ended.
But he warned that Singapore's system of government and politics must be above reproach and without graft of any kind.
"As painful as it is to act against a colleague and friend, it is our duty to do so when necessary. Our system of government and politics must always stay clean and free from corruption," said Wong, adding that public officials in whom the public had placed their trust had to hold to the highest standards of integrity.
"This is absolutely vital and non-negotiable," Wong said.
Cabinet ministers are paid more than $400,000 a year, compared with the median annual salary of $48,000, in part to lessen temptation in what is the wealth capital of southeast Asia and possibly the entire region.
Iswaran, Singapore's first politician to face a criminal prosecution in almost a half-century, is set to surrender Sunday to begin his sentence at Singapore's tough Changi Prison where death row inmates are held and prisoners sleep on straw mattresses on the cell floor.
Ruled for almost six decades by the party of Singapore's founding father the late Lee Kuan Yew, the city-state is renowned for its orderliness, low crime and clean civil service and government in a region swamped in corruption, consistently ranking in the top least corrupt states globally.
But, alas, corruption is everywhere.
China on track to break 2023 ‘tigers’ record as top anti-corruption watchdog nets 44
Four officials held over past fortnight take total to highest for January to September, one short of the record 45 for the whole of 2023
The latest “tiger” to fall is again one of its own, a senior inspector from the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) – China’s top political disciplinary and anti-corruption agency.
The CCDI announced on Monday that Li was “under disciplinary review and supervision investigation” for “suspected serious violations of discipline and law” – a common official euphemism for corruption.
Three other senior officials have also been placed under investigation on similar charges over the past fortnight.
They are Cao Xingxin, deputy general manager of state-held telecoms giant China Unicom; Sun Yuning, deputy director of the General Administration of Customs; and former deputy education minister Du Yubo.
Two more have since been added to the 2023 total, with the Politburo announcing in June that former defence ministers Li Shangfu and Wei Fenghe had also been placed under investigation last year.
All of the detained tigers – as the CCDI refers to them – belonged to a pool of officials known as “centrally managed cadres”, meaning they held ranks at the deputy ministerial level or above.
A smaller number held slightly lower ranks but occupied key positions in critical sectors.
Long was placed under investigation in February and expelled from the party in August over serious violations of party discipline and law.
The CCDI must “resolutely prevent and address misdeeds”, he said, to strengthen the building of a disciplinary inspection and supervision team and become a “model of self-reform”.
Li spent four decades of his career in his home province of Sichuan, where he served as deputy provincial governor before being transferred to neighbouring Yunnan province in 2021.
News of Li’s downfall came just two days after the CCDI announced the detention of China Unicom’s Cao, who had also worked for decades in the organisation department.
Cao, 58, served as party secretary of the National Organisation Cadre College until January last year, when he was posted to China Unicom. The college is in charge of training promising human resource officials within the party and reports directly to the Central Organisation Department.
Also last week, Sun became the highest-ranking serving customs official to face a corruption probe since the clean-up drive was launched more than 11 years ago.
Corruption investigators have reported a slew of crackdowns in various customs offices and entry points across the country in recent years.
He was detained in March 2022, five years after his retirement, and expelled from the party six months later. The allegations against him included “using public power as a tool for personal gain”.
Last December, Sheng was sentenced to 15 years in jail and fined 6 million yuan (US$853,000) for influence-peddling and taking nearly 64 million yuan in bribes between 2004 and 2022.
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