This will be filed in court today: :-)
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IN THE SUBORDINATE COURT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SINGAPORE

PS NO . 727/06 & others )

YAP KENG HO

PUBLIC PROSECUTOR

SUMISSION OF DEFENSE

To the Honourable the Judges of the Subordinate Court of Singapore.

The reply of YAP KENG HO

To AGC's Closing Submission

Paragraph Number corresponding to AGC's Closing Submission: -

The video footage showed that:

There were 2 cash boxes on SDP's sales desk with cash within
There were price @$2/= signs on SDP's sales desk
Books written by Dr Chee were displayed and sold from the desk
The New Democrat Published by SDP were displayed and sold at the desk in quantity of hundreds
There was a poster of Dr. Chee's book titled Power Of Courage setup next to sales desk
SDP members were making sales, and members of public were purchasing The New Democrats from SDP @S$2/=
Video indicated that Hundreds of Copies were sold to buyers
Buyers did not all arrived nor left at a scheduled time, just come & go as they pass by, and left soon after purchasing
No buyer had stayed from the beginning till the end of the sales event
people who were there at the entire length of event were the SDP's sellers and Police were the ones staying the longest to listen to any alleged Public Entertainment

Video & transcripts both show that defendant Yap was at the microphone / loud speaker not exceeding 3 minutes, in the entire even that police had taken 30 minutes of video.

I had stated clearly that video was taken in angles and from position as well as with willful and bad faith intention to criminalize the dependents. That the video camera was pan / tilt / zoom and moved about to deliberately capture as well as avoid capturing certain facts of the case. This were given in my submission dated 6.Mar.2008.

Woodland MRT Station is within the contested Sembawang GRC, in which SDP's party members and election agent held legitimate electoral activities, which is criminalize by The Executive Government & their Police as well as legislative parliament, which SDP's is contesting in the election against the ministers and Mps.

I don't need to give evidence in witness box. I had made 3 minutes or less in total of sales announcement for The New Democrats in proven purpose to sell them @S$2 in order to raise funds for the election campaign. Therefore this had to be DONE BEFORE POLLING DATE IS ANNOUNCE, because it takes time to raise sufficient funds through sales at only @S$2 per copy of The New Democrats which is tiny amount. The video & transcript already proved that I was announcing the sale event and introducing the contents of The New Democrats in order that my hundreds of buyers knows what I am selling. The evidence is sufficient already to prove that I am not guilty. So I need not testify for myself. However I did offer to Dr Chee to testify for him, if he wants to call me to the stand to testify for him. But he also found that it is unnecessary to have my testimony to defend himself. I told the court that if Dr. Chee need me to testify I will take the witness stand. Not Dr Chee nor Judge nor DPP asked me to testify. And DPP is trying to claim that I remain silent. I am far from being silent unless DPP was asleep in the court.

The transcript & video proved that, as well as the prosecution's witnesses also proved that, it was a sales event in which hundreds of copies of The New Democrat were sold as a result of SDP's activities there. @S$2 per copy hundreds of dollars were raised as a result. That was testified by Dr. Chee, that the funds was necessary to finance SDP's election campaign in Sembawang GRC for General Election 2006. Sale of news letters is not Public Entertainment. It is sales and purchase activity same as hawkers selling their products and banks promoting their credit cards or handphone companies promoting their services. There is no entertainment provide. No one had came to SDP's sales desk for entertainment purposes and no one had been entertained, as shown and proven by the evidence.

In the General Election 2006, it should be considered the ELECTORS as stated in Parliamentary Election Act chapter 218 (2) within Sembawang GRC as defined by chapter 218 (8) as Electoral Division, and chapter 218 (8A ) as Group Representative Constituencies (GRC) are to be taken into serious view here. SDP was conducting electoral activity under Chapter 218. defendant Yap is a legitimate Election Agent appointed by SDP according to Chapter 218 (62) and was conducting sales in the fund raising stage of the election activity on 8^th April 2006, which was just about 30 days before the polling on 6^th May 2006. When a Legitimate Election Agent was conducting activity for the purpose of election within the GRC contested, it should not be deem as a public entertainment. It is serious activity provided by law. In the example listed in para 14 of AGC's closing submission near the end of para 14, “play readings, recitals, lectures, talks,...” it does not include SALES nor ELECTION activities. Sales are commercial activities not the same as entertainment. Election are definitely not for entertainment. defendant is proven to be an election agent for SDP as testified by Dr. Chee, and was conducting sales of news letters @S$2 per copy within Sembawang GRC, as testified by Dr. Chee, in order to raise sufficient fund to finance SDP's campaign for General Election 2006, as testified by Dr. Chee. This is not any entertainment at all. An election agent doing this can not be guilty for providing public entertainment, because there were no concert, no music, no lecture, no talks, no performance made. An election agent was merely announcing sales of news letters @S$2 per copy and introducing it content that readers and ELECTORS can read after buying a copy. Nothing exceeding the need of sales & fund raising were done at Woodlands MRT on 8^th April 2006.

Public Entertainment is not determind by it's purpose or its nature and or effect but simply by it form. The form was fund raising and sales. Which are both not entertaining in terms of form. Election is provided by law. SDP were doing that according to law, and had cooperated with enforcement fully, however the enforcement of law had bad faith to criminalize the SDP deliberately. SDP had tried their best to work with enforcement to avoid infringement of any law, but the enforcement had been dead set for purpose of criminalizing SDP. The officers denied their identities and kept filming and did not even speak to the defendant at the scene. This is clearly proven. There is no FORMAL OCCSSION, people at Woodlands MRT just past by and was attracted to buy copies of The New Democrat and then left very soon after buying and they proceeded to their own destination after buying. The buyers were not organized in any way to come to Woodlands MRT to attend any formal activity held by SDP. The buyers just informally chanced by the sales desk to discovered that The New Democrats were on sale @S$2 per copy & they bought and left the place to their own destination after buying. There was no gathering or assembly of buyers in any way, the police and prosecution did not find any disorderly conduct nor nuisance nor hazard at Woodlands MRT. The entire activity is far from any entertainment by nature and by FORM. No one went there to provide any entertainment. No one went there to get any entertainment. No one was entertained there by SDP. There was however a busker performing musical entertainment there unrelated to SDP and the police were obviously uninterested! If election activity of SDP in form is deemed as entertainment then similar activities of all political parties and independent candidates are to be deem as entertainment in form. SDP can not be discriminated by law in singularity and unfairly.
How can sales and fund raising address conducted lawfully under Parliamentary Election Act be deemed as entertainment? It is regulated by Chapter 218 and not Chapter 257. In order to criminalize SDP, the charge is politically motivated and abusive. That Chapter 257 had been abused to unlawfully regulate the activities provided under Chapter 218, for the ill-willed purpose of criminalizing opposition after the election. That shameful government had been ashamed by opposition during the general election is taking political revenge on opposition by abusing Chapter 257 to criminalize opposition's lawful electoral activities provided and conducted in accordance of Chapter 218. Who had been ENTERTAINED BY LEE KUAN YEW'S ELECTION SPEECHES? Are his election speeches for entertainment? In para 16 of AGC's closing submission, all the alleged speakings in Mandarin and Cantonese, A scandal involving PAP, the government using tax payers money to invest in a drug syndicate, and how the PAP was putting o a pretense of being morally superior etc. were all published in 2 full pages inside The New Democrats news letter which was being sold. It was proven during the cross examination with the CID translator that the entire scandal of drug money was printed in lengthy great details in English as well as Chinese inside The New Democrats news letter which is the defense's exhibit. The drug money scandal is printed on Page 12 in full page with photos of drug lords and late president Ong Teng Cheong. The Chinese version is printed on page 21 in full page in thousands of words. The CID translator verified that the alleged speech in the video and transcript directly referred to these printed articles exposing the same scandal. And that witness agreed that the alleged speech would fit the introduction of these printed contents inside The New Democrats which SDP introduced to the buyers to interest them to come forward to buy and read about this scandal. Transcript Page 7 16:08:53 reads “You all come and patronize buy a copy, in there we have a big scandal – a big secret of the PAP what is it?” This is obvious that merely an introduction had been made to inform buyers of The New Democrats that they can read about a big drug money scandal published inside The New Democrats and so please come and buy a copy. This is within a normal sales introduction and announcement. The political nature of it should not be discriminated by law, and such discrimination is unlawful. As to the point of formality, it is irrelevant for an election activity, weather how formal or informal should election activity be, it should be regulated by chapter 218 and not chapter 257. An election agent's activity within election period conducted lawfully in accordance with chapter 218 should not be interfering with chapter 257 nor be found guilty by chapter 257, otherwise there is a major flaw of legislation as well as enforcement here which victimized the SDP unfairly.
Sales introduction & promotion of news letter is a proven fact. And defendant did not exceed doing just that on 8^th April 2006. That such activity is done daily by countless of sellers all over Singapore and none had been put to face charges under PEMA. It is discriminatory unlawfully that defendant had been charged while others are not. Most of the 3 mins of announcement, were informing the buyers the progress of sales, that hundreds of copies were sold and only 40 copies were left, and that sales activity is going to end soon, so please buy before the news letters are sold out. Further that another 25 copies out of reminding 40 had been sold to an individual buyer who wish to give them to those who could not afford to buy @S$2 per copy. Beside in FORM & NATURE these announcements are sale instead of public entertainment, this is a sales for purpose of fund raising for the general election in Sembawang GRC, done by contesting SDP and their election agents for the lawful purpose of General Election 2006 provided under Chapter 218. This is not a claim but proven by evidence in the trial, and it is valid defense, because that charge are proven to be irrelevant and willfully abused to criminalize opposition.
para 18 is a repetition of para 15. The form is DIRECT REFERENCE to the news letters being sold, and stating the price, and asking people to buy, and telling people what they can find and read inside this news letter. There is no extra speech what so ever, exceeding this. By criminalizing this sale, the government will effectively be targeting the fund raising activity for general election, which will be a politically motivated abuse of law. Since preventing opposition party to raise fund is direct and effective means of eliminating competition within General Election and it is deemed illegal as provided in Chapter 218 (57)(58)(59)(60)(61) as corrupted practices to financially incapacitate election opponent. The prosecution's submission that the dependents had provided public entertainment is invalid and wrong. The activity conducted by SDP on 8^th April 2006 should had been heard by an Election Court instead provided under Chapter 218 (87), to determine weather the announcements and sales of news letter and raising funds for the election campaign within Sembawang GRC constitute to any Illegal Practices or not. Chapter 257 is irrelevant and not applicable to regulate the activity of SDP conducted within Sembawang GRC, during General Election 2006, by candidates, and party leadership and lawful election agents. Any political banners & uniforms etc won or use or displayed by SDP should be regulated by Chapter 218 (77) (78A) (78B) (78C) etc. not to be claimed as formality under chapter 257 as the prosecution did.
Election news letters and publications and even speeches are to be regulated by Chapter 218, and these activities are directed to ELECTORS as provided Chapter 218(5) that the legitimate electors support their candidates and fund their candidate and buy election publications from their candidates' party etc. This is not to be defined nor regulated by Chapter 257 which is wrongly applied. On 8^th April 2006, SDP was in the fund raising phase for the general election, and it took months to raise sufficient funds for the campaign by selling news letters, it had to be done months before the election. The funds raised by SDP with sales of news leters during general elections are regulated by Chapter 218 (65)(66) and reported to election department as election expenses under Chapter 218 (74) lawfully and published in Gazette in accordance to Chapter 218 (75). If there is anything deemed should be regulated under Chapter 218 (69) and (70) as illegal practice, PEMA shouldn't be applicable here and Chapter 218 should be the governing law for SDP's activities conducted in accordance of Chapter 218.
The activity is directed at ELECTORS according to Chapter 218 and not the public. Further:

there is no formal gathering for public at that location on that day
there is no meeting event banner nor sign nor a rally schedule
there is no meeting or assembly schedule
there is no speaker list or guest list no predetermined list of people attending any formal event
only ELECTORS of Sembawang GRC passing by without any intention to attend any event and arriving randomly without any schedule to buy news letters from SDP
no one was informed to hold nor attend any rally or talk, only ELECTORS of Sembawang GRC passing by were being informed that SDP's news letter is available for sale @S$2 per copy and why they should buy a copy
ELECTORS just buy and left randomly
no ELECTORS were staying long enough to hear any rally nor speech, not even the police had spend time there throughout the entire sales event from beginning till end.
most buyers come and buy and leave within few minutes
in a rally or talk event of SDP it wouldn't be done this way
all addresses made were only for satisfying the purpose of sales and purchase of books and news letters.
everything was orderly and peaceful and the police were not finding any security issue there
the police ignored other loud musical public entertainment provided by busker near SDP
SDP told police constantly that all observations and cooperation with enforcement will be given to ensure no infringement of law to happen, but police acted stupid and deliberately want to criminalize SDP.
I definitely dispute that activity is directed to AGC's claimed of “public”. It was directed to ELECTORS as defined by Chapter 218.

ii & iii are irrelevant. Weather formal or informal it was done as Chapter 218 required and within the providence of Chapter 218, which did not have any definition that electoral activity must be formal or informal or which is illegal. Nor in law governing sales that required sales to be done formally or informally. Election can not be done away or apart from ELECTORS, it is a legally provided activity requiring interactions and communications between candidates and parties and ELECTORS, weather they are considered public or entertainment or formal or informal are all irrelevant.
Electoral activities are provided by Parliamentary Election Act, not PEMA, and abusively applying PEMA in order to prevent opposition to conduct electoral activities is not only unconstitutional it is corrupted and criminal. It is beyond doubt in the trial that SDP were selling news letters @S$2 per copy to raise fund for General Election 2006's campaign within Sembawang GRC all in accordance of Parliamentary Election Act. Candidates and leaders and lawful election agents were conducting legitimate electoral activities, and had been wrongfully convicted before under PEMA. This is a shame for the law of Republic of Singapore.
Free Speech under constitution article 14 should be even more strongly guarded during election period. Abusive application of PEMA in the violation of article 14 is not just a violation of constitution. It is a corruption crime by itself. This is a corrupt practice politically motivated to prevent opposition from raising political issues during election and challenge the wrongs done by government in power. Charging and convicting opposition for speech during election period is a very clear action of abuse and oppression, done most corruptively and shamefully evil.
I fully concur with B1
It is proven by evidence in this trial that Busker performing music near the SDP were ignored by the police officer filming him with the SDP and he was not investigated nor charged. This is direct evidence of DISCRIMINATORY TREATMENT & ENFORCEMENT. What better prove do I need to offer?
There is no offense by dependents who conducted legitimate electoral activities and sales. This is no the same as others selling food or clothes or other products, because Chapter 218 does not provide for these activities unrelated to election.
The lack of a police report had sadly became a formality for police to hide behind and discharge their liabilities of unfairness and discrimination in this case. Here we have a case, that police on the scene selectively enforced law against only SDP, ignoring busker at the scene who had been film. Can the lack of a police report justify or cover up such blatant discrimination and unfairness? If a murder took place at scene filmed by police also lack a police report then would the murder also be ignored by law enforcement? How is the lack of a report able to justify such corrupt and irresponsible action by the state police?
This is a situation that the police selectively enforce and lack a standard guideline and fairness, they play with their enforcement role according to their own views and opinions and continence. That law enforcement is self-contradicting and misleading the public on how to follow the law during legitimate activities that they made all efforts to cooperate and comply and avoid infringing law. That citizens and political parties are selectively criminalize without a fair standard of treatment. That this activity can be deemed legal today but not the next day by the same enforcement.
There is no ignorance of law here in this case, but abuse of law and prosecution however is obvious. There is clear discrimination and selective prosecution as well as misapplication of PEMA on electoral activities. It there is ignorance of law in this case it would be on the part of the prosecution and the enforcement.
I don't make any such defense of ignorance of law. I insist that I fell victim of political persecution, via abusive application of PEMA on the Electoral Activities I conducted in accordance of Parliamentary Election Act, as a lawful election agent of SDP in Sembawang GRC.

I strongly object to para 32. That:

Witnesses had been caught and proven lying on the stand, they testified against the integrity of each other.
Witnesses misled the court and defense regarding many facts of the case. Including time of photo and how did it ended up wrong.
Witnesses are still unable to establish WHY the evidence had wrongly been prepared with 2 different versions of time.
Witnesses have a lot to hide and are obviously covering up lots of facts in the trial
witnesses consist of police officers who assumed the role of public first informant, full of political motive.
Witnesses consist of police officer who did not identify themselves at scene and lied about their identity as police officer at scene. Proof of bad faith and ill-will showing discriminatory enforcement of law. And thus their testimony are not reliable.
Witness had been found appearing in video that they initially denied but were forced to admit the truth on stand. SIO Charles Soon was filmed with a copy of The New Democrats in his hand but he denied. Showing that he have intention only to criminalize the opposition during his duty.
SGT Lam lied on stand regarding his knowledge of the mistake on the time. He was caught eavesdropping the proceeding in court from the witness room's class window when he was ordered by judge to return to the witness room, so that he would not hear the contention argued between prosecution and defense. This act amount to tempering as a witness under oath of honesty. SGT Lam is also proven to be manipulating his video camera to avoid capturing SIO Charles Soon, attempting to capture the news letters buyers who purchased 25 copies, and initially avoid to capture me in the video but later changed to zoom into me all according to the content and political sensitivity of my announcements. This shows his political angle of law enforcement and unfairly criminalizing the defendants. His testimonies are not to be trusted. I ask the court to deal with his lying on witness stand.
I had put all these in my written submission dated 6.March.2008, and AGC is unable to reply to any of these issue. How dare he now claim in para 32 that there is no issue on credibility of any winess?
I had been stopped by judge in many occasions in rebuttals against the charge, and had been directed by judge to put all my points only in final submission. I am thus doing so. I didn't remain silent but was silent by the trial judge indeed. I had also been prevented by judge to tender evidence which I had given to AGC, which are dozens of video taken in Singapore showing major businesses and hawkers and buskers are all providing similar and even more elaborated public entertainments and many are doubtlessly without any licenses. The judge prevent me from tendering my evidence to prove my defense of discriminatory treatment defense. I will appeal on this ruling to higher court.

34.My co-defendant is doing the same electoral activity as the Secretary General of SDP, we are both not guilty and should be acquitted, the abusive charge should in fact be dismissed. The witnesses who are found to have lied on the stand should be sentenced accordingly.

I have no fear nor regret towards my lawful and proud actions during General Election 2006. I condemn the coward Lee Kuan Yew famiLEE LEEgime which shamefully and cowardly abused PEMA to fix the opposition. I assure these cowards that they can not stop us. The are not going to succeed. They will be held accountable and responsible eventually for these cowardly corrupted acts and I ask the people of Singapore to uphold justice and equality upon liquidation of this corrupted LEEgime. It has no legitimacy since it only claimed to be elected via a corrupted election involving corrupt practice of vote buying, via Progress Package involving S$2.6 billion of cash in total handed to voters just only 5 days before the polling. This election should had been annulled in accordance of Parliamentary Election Act Chapter 218 (90) that vote buying is illegal corrupt practice under this law.

Can such a coward corrupted regime rule us in fear? The answer is NO, NOT ANY MORE. NOT NOW. NOT EVER.

Dated the 4th day of April 2008

________________________________

YAP KENG HO

THE DEFENDENT

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SINGAPORE

PS NO . 727/06 & others )

YAP KENG HO