by Joshua Chiang
“Can they say they didn’t torture me?”
“I never advocated nor used violent means, and there were never any deaths during our strikes,” former ISA detainee Michael J Fernandez said at a press conference held at his lawyer’s office this morning.
He was responding to the Ministry of Home Affairs’ letter to the Straits Times, claiming that he was part of the Communist United Front (CUF), an appendage of the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) and a “violent underground organisation that waged a protracted insurgency for several decades to overthrow the constitutionally elected governments of Singapore and Malaysia.”
The MHA’s response followed Fernandez’s announcement on 23 December that he planned to sue the Singapore government “for battery and negligence arising from the torture committed upon him, resulting in a breach of fundamental human rights”.
Fernandez was arrested under the Internal Security Act (ISA) on 11 September 1964 and detained without trial until April 1973. At the time of his arrest, he was the General Secretary of the Naval Base Labour Union and had been organising workers’ strikes around Singapore.
At the press conference, Fernandez also denied that he was a member of the Communist United Front. Calling the government’s accusation a ‘smokescreen’, he said that the fact that the government didn’t prosecute him in open court showed that it knew he was not a member of the CUF.
“We [he and his colleagues who were arrested] never convened for the overthrow of the governments in either territories [Singapore and Malaysia],” Fernandez added. “The strikes were about better working conditions and better pay for the workers in the naval base.”
Responding to MHA’s statement that he was detained by an order issued by the then-Malaysian Minister of Interior Security and Minister of Home Affairs Tun Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman [Singapore still part of the Federation of Malaysia in 1964], Fernandez pointed out that Singapore became independent in 1965.
“Why did they continue to detain me for another seven years?” He asked.
Fernandez also said that the fact that the MHA statement didn’t address his main complaint of torture and inhumane treatment during his detention shows that the government apparently condoned the act.
“Can they say they didn’t torture me?” he asked.
“Lee Kuan Yew instigated Operation Coldstore.”
During the press conference, Fernandez also referred to Operation Coldstore. He said it was Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew who instigated the arrests of February 1963, although it is widely believed that Lee was at most a reluctant player.
Fernandez referred to an excerpt of the recently declassified Colonial Office papers published in “The Fajar Generation”, in which Baron Philip Moore, who was Deputy High Commissioner of Britain in Singapore from 1963 to 1965, was quoted as saying:
He (Lee) went on to suggest that in order to avoid the Communists taking over, he would create a situation in which the UK Commissioner would be force to suspend the Constitution. This might be done either by the Singapore Government inviting a Russian trade mission to Singapore thus forcing a constitutional crisis, or by instigating riots and disorder, requiring the intervention of British troops. I did however, form the impression that he was quite certain he would lose a general election and was seriously toying with the thought of forcing British intervention in order to prevent his political enemies from forming a government. (CO 1030/1149 p.95, para 3)
Speaking to The Online Citizen after the press conference, Fernandez said that his arrest was also politically motivated.
“I don’t know how the government can claim I was a threat to the security of Singapore,” Fernandez said. “In fact I fought for the workers of Singapore, the people of Singapore.”
Legal action to be taken against Malaysian Government as well
Notes from within: Michael Fernandez wrote his thoughts on the books he read while in detention on toilet paper which he later glued onto the pages of this notebook
During the press conference, Fernandez’s lawyer M. Ravi also announced that a writ of summons will be issued to the Malaysian Government, through his associate firm in Malaysia later this week.
He was responding to MHA’s statement that Singapore was part of Malaysia at the time of Fernandez’s arrest in September 1964.
Ravi maintained that his client would also continue to pursue legal action against the Singapore Government.
Ravi also said that there were forty other detainees who went on a hunger strike alongside Fernandez. Like him, they were force fed and tortured. Many of them are still alive and living in Malaysia.
“Once we file the writ in Malaysia, We will get all of them to testify in the Malaysian court,” he said.
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From another blog : There are three things you need to know about Singapore.
1. The only political violence that has happened in the last 45 years in Singapore are the ones inflicted on political prisoners behind the walls of the Internal Security Department.
2. The Internal Security Act has been abused (to serve political ends) more often than it has been used appropriately (to safeguard national security).
3. The people and the institution responsible for the political violence and the abuse of ISA are still in power today. Open discussions on such topics remained sensitive, and even outlawed, in Singapore. (Eg. The ban on the videos of Lim Hock Siew and Said Zahari)
Very difficult to accept what Fernandez had gone thru did happen, surely not in a place like Singapore.
If it is the truth, nothing but the truth, all those people who had a hand in it, would face retribution, even their descendants would have to pay for their elders’ sins.
Fernandez, though you would never win the case, but the outcome is not important, it is the process of the revelations that is the gist, let Singaporeans share in your injustice and the pain you had suffered.
God Almighty, such things happened here?
LKY owes Singaporean explanation of those declassified colonial office document.
Don’t tell us it is another cocktail talk.
A follower of Machiavellianism will never have to say i am sorry.
There are two major and pertinent points that have to be made here:
1. the blanket charge of being a ‘communist’ levelled against Mr Fernandez by Lee Kuan Yew’s government; and,
2. who – Malaysia or Singapore – had jurisdiction in Mr Fernandez’ detention.
I will take each of the above points in turn.
It should be increasingly known to Singaporeans by now that it is none other than Lee Kuan Yew who is the progenitor of the extremist political ideology of fascism in this country; after being firmly in power, he proceeded to infect swathes of the Singapore population with the toxicity of that ideology. Singaporeans in his party as well as those in the upper echelons of the administrative services are selected on that basis alone. (The ruling party defines that basis as one criterion for political talent as well as talent befitting of top civil service positions.)
As someone who espouses the furthest right political ideology, it is not unexpected that a fascist (or fascists) would feel antagonized by any ideological expression arising from the various bands on the left of the political spectrum in exactly the same way that those who lean left politically feel antagonized by political conservatism and worse, fascism. (Lee Kuan Yew’s predecessor and fellow fascist, Adolf Hitler felt EXACTLY and SIMILARLY antagonized by the left or left leaning politicians, sending many of them to their deaths in Nazi Germany’s notorious concentration camps.)
The question to ask then is: Does feeling antagonized by a vastly different political ideology constitute a threat to internal security?
Not only that, it would seem that the many Singaporeans including Mr Fernandez who had been detained under the ISA were not communists (or authoritarian socialists) in the least but were more likely DEMOCRATIC socialists.
It is also known, at least to me that, Lee Kuan Yew, despite having spent more than half a century in politics, is completely unknowledgeable on the tools of his own career in politics. That ignorance – or is it really the distortion resulting from the mischief that I suspect was involved – is why many Singaporeans are unable to distinguish between authoritarian socialism – complete with authoritarianism and leanings towards centrally planned economies – and democratic socialism that does not reject democracy nor capitalism, even if they tend to lean towards curbing capitalism’s excesses. Even Chiam See Tong made these gaffes in two seperate comments he made on democratic socialism which I will not elaborate on at this point.
But I also believe that there is foul play involved in this and many other charges made of espousing communism. In Singapore’s political mythology, communism is equated to violence, and very mischievously, I might add.
It is precisely why, in the MHA’s letter to its propoganda tool, ST, Yap Neng Jye writes, “…[Michael Fernandez] is doing a grave injustice to the many innocent lives, including that of workers and their families, which were destroyed or painfully disrupted by CPM violence and CUF civil strife over several decades in Singapore and Malaysia.” It’s the vile manner that the ruling party has always used the administrative services to make the charge of violence – a threat to internal security – stick.
But did Mr Fernandez himself advocate violence as a means to his political ends? If he didn’t, which ‘innocent lives’ has he done a direct and grave injustice to in his own political activities?
(cont…)
(…cont)
I now move on to the question of jurisdiction. (Please note that I do not have all the facts at my disposal, especially on the specificities, but hope to point others in a direction that I feel is worth further investigation.)
It is undeniably true that Singapore was a state in Malaysia in 1964. But merely washing the PAP government’s hands of all responsibility in this matter by dismissing Mr Fernandez’ allegations about his torture as a responsibility of the Malaysian government is further proof to me of the mischief that the PAP government frequently gets up to. Here, they are exploiting once again the low levels of political literacy in the Singapore population to further their self serving goals.
Malaysia in 1964, just as it is now, is a federal system. Importantly, in any federal system, there is a division of powers between the federal government, in this case the government in Kuala Lumpur, and the state governments who rule their individual states – only – from the various state capitals; the federal government has jurisdiction over some areas while the state governments in others. (Though irrelevant here, municipal governments have yet other powers that are assigned to them.) All of these should be clearly stipulated in the Malaysian Constitution and/or other historical or court documents. Even in those areas where there is joint jurisdiction by both levels of government, their seperate jurisdictions are always very clearly defined and enunciated.
Typically in a federal state, the federal government has complete jurisdiction over defence, foreign policy, and finance along with other less well known areas such as postal services.
Just as typically, at least as far as federal states set up by the former British colonial governments goes, the federal government legislates the criminal code, but it is the state governments, specifically the home affairs ministries of the component states, that are responsible for the administration of that code. This includes in the first instance IDENTIFYING an individual as having committed a transgression of the law. (This is also where I concede that further investigation into the precise roles of the two governments has to be made.)
Thus who was really responsible for Mr Fernandez’ detention and allegations of torture: the state government of Singapore or the federal government of Malaysia?
communism is a word that serves the PAP.
They use it to get rid of the opposition.
Same thing with longevity.
It is a word LHL/Dr. Hen uses to stop people from withdrawing their CPF monies at 55 and make them work longer.
Same thing with constructive opposition.
It is a term LKY/GCT has used to destroy Chee to discredit the opposition and to raise their own pay in the process.
TUN DR ISMAIL ABDUL RAHMAN AND LIM CHIN SIONG WILL COMES UP FROM THE GRAVE AND TELL THE TRUTH.
Tha MMan has betrayed everyone he knew for his own gain. He married his wife, much older than him because he was afraid she will overtake him as she was much smarter than him. He befriended and made use of so many people just so that his family will benefit, now idiot boy is PM.
I wish that this case could be brought to an International court or in Britain, where all the documents are. It will a final chance to put the our local Hitler to the stand and grill the truth out of him. Did anyone realise that the MHA was quick to renounce that we were a Crown colony.
“Without Prejudice”
Robox
Political literacy is decent in Singapore, just not so relevant in a unitary state and not a federal state.
The strong federal system you refer to works in USA and to a certain extent or Canada and LATAM countries like Mexico or some European countries eg Spain.
It does not work for weak federal systems like Malaysia for the simple reason as there are no independent levers of action eg state police, or state territorial army and very limited state budget.
If you may recall, there is only the federal police and federal army and federal intellegience services or even immigration control, the only independent military unit at time of Federal Union was in Borneo or state of Johor as known at the time.
All other territorial armies were funded and raised by federal government
The only state power actions possible were only in regards to the administration/taxation, education and medical or transport or housing at the time which you opined.
Regards
Last night, I aas watching a documentary on the Nazi leader Gorterin (not sure if spelling was correct) who, with Hitler initiated the persecution of Jews, torturing of the POW etc.
He was sentenced to gallows by the International Militiary Tribunal. But he committed suicide on the eve of his sentence.
Jolly Hangman story.
ISD is clearly a political tool, and not for national security or counter terror agency. Ask MSK, and he will give you a good laugh!
Poor ISD must have lost alot of powers lately.
LKY MUST BE SUBPOENAED SOONEST BEFORE HE KICK THE ‘DUSTBIN’OR CASE LOST
This is a case involving the internal palace, we really need to recall ‘Pau Kong’ from Heaven to convene this court case. He is very good at it during his time.
Wang, thanks for spelling out the seperate areas of jurisdiction of Malaysia’s federal and state government’s. The information regarding the federal police was particularly useful because it is an indicator of who performs law enforcement. Still, this is something I feel Ravi in particular needs to verify before proceeding with the case. (We know the pull-the-carpet-from-under-your-feet tricks that the judiciaries in authoritarian states play; it’s best to go prepared with counterarguments in that eventuality.)
Yes, I had always known that Malaysia’s federalism is classed as a weak one, but because I did not know what the precise federal-state arrangements were, I was holding out the hope that because it had a common heritage with other British commonwealth federal states like Canada, Australia and India, it may have the relative stronger arrangements of federalism that those three countries have.
However, I would disagree with your opening statement, “Political literacy is decent in Singapore…”.
I don’t blame the people for it for this weakness; blame lies squarely with the PAP’s defrauding of the media’s proper functioning as well as their larger scale de-skilling of the Singapore population politically.
Also, when you say that political literacy is ‘just not so relevant in a unitary state’, I would ask “why?” when we need the knowledge of political concepts, processes and all the terminology associated with them just as much as people who live in federal states do. (Perhaps, you meant that only the political literacy regarding federalism in general, and the Malaysian one in particular is not as relevant to Singaporeans. I would normally agree with a statement like that except that this case has thrown up the fact that it is still relevant to Singaporeans though I also concede that it may do just as well as esoteric information.)
Still, I am pleased to note that there is a class of people in Singapore – mostly online – that I consider to be fast learners. Throw out those concepts, processes, and terminology and watch them take it and run.
It gives me hope, to say the least.
One more thing Wang, I refer to this statement from the article:
“[Michael Fernandez] said it was Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew who instigated the arrests of February 1963…”
If that were indeed the case, it remains unclear whether initiating prosecution/detention via arrest falls within the state government’s jurisdiction.
(To bring balance to the above quote, I will include the rejoinder to it, “…although it is widely believed that Lee was at most a reluctant player.”)
I also hope that you paid attention to this”
[Quote]
Fernandez referred to an excerpt of the recently declassified Colonial Office papers published in “The Fajar Generation”, in which Baron Philip Moore, who was Deputy High Commissioner of Britain in Singapore from 1963 to 1965, was quoted as saying:
He (Lee) went on to suggest that in order to avoid the Communists taking over, he would create a situation in which the UK Commissioner would be force to suspend the Constitution. This might be done either by the Singapore Government inviting a Russian trade mission to Singapore thus forcing a constitutional crisis, or by instigating riots and disorder, requiring the intervention of British troops. I did however, form the impression that he was quite certain he would lose a general election and was seriously toying with the thought of forcing British intervention in order to prevent his political enemies from forming a government. (CO 1030/1149 p.95, para 3)
[Endquote]
This is the Constitution of Malaysia which was adopted even when Singapore was part of Malaysia.
http://confinder.richmond.edu/admin/docs/malaysia.pdf
(Please scroll down to p 173/4.)
As defined in List I (Federal List), internal security falls under the federal government’s jurisdiction.
[Quote]
3. Internal security, including -
(a) Police; criminal investigation; registration of criminals; public order;
(b) Prisons, reformatories; remand homes; place of detention; probation of offenders; juvenile offenders;
(c) Preventive detention; restriction of residence;
(d) Intelligence services; and
(e) National registration.
[Endquote]
Assuming there has been no amendment to this List since its adoption with regards to the federal government’s jurisdiction over internal security, I am now left with these thoughts:
1. Whether used by the Malaysian government, the ISA remains an instrument of evil; neither government has (or has ever had) the intellectual nor moral capacity to use it judiciously; any action to undermine its use must therefore be taken.
2. Notwithstanding #1, what was Lee Kuan Yew’s role in Mr Fernandez’ arrest and detention? Specifically, instead of conflating what are really seperate matters as he is prone to do, is he schooled enough to distinguish between:
a) democratic socialism and authoritarian, nay totalitarian socialism (communism);
b) communism and the incitement to violence?
3. Why did the Singapore government continue to hold Mr Fernandez in detention after independence, and was he tortured during that period? Why did the government of independent Singapore re-arrest Mr Fernandez in 1973, again after charging that he was a communist, and was tehre torture then? (These are now very firmly matters that are in the Singapore government’s jurisdiction.)
4. Despite jurisdiction being in the federal government’s hands, who was responsible for Mr Fernandez’ torture in a Singapore detention cell and where did the order to employ torture come from? Also, did Mr Fernandez suffer more torture after he was re-arrested in 1973, which if he did, would make this responsibility squarely that of the Singapore government?
I can assure you that the people in MFA, AG and Home Affairs are working round the clock to dig up counter claims. But this time round is two nil in favour of Mr Fernandez these being the internet and his writings. He should publish his writings on line asap even a part of it. TR please look into this.The writing is on the wall for the PAP. We will then know who is telling the truth. Maybe KLY should step down now and LSL should come up with some statement, but we know it will not happen and the fall will be pain for the both of them and the family.
Sue this guy for defamation if what he said is not justified!!!
Yap Neng Jye writes, “…[Michael Fernandez] is doing a grave injustice to the many innocent lives, including that of workers and their families, which were destroyed or painfully disrupted by CPM violence and CUF civil strife over several decades in Singapore and Malaysia.”
Our MDA has banned Dr. Lim Hock Siew’s speech without even the minimum decency to point out to us which part of it contains half-truths. Is it just because LKY say so ?
Are we really that daft to accept such a sweeping statement that it contains half-truths ? At least tell us which part is the truth and which part is not ? There is actually no such thing as half-truth for an answer.
Of course, unless if someone is actually lying to us to prevent us from knowing the truth. Or is it because maybe nobody including LKY can really handle the truth ?
And the best part of it all is they even had the guts and the hypocrisy to call someone else a recalcitrant liar, remember ?
politics, politics, politics, are they always fair anywhere? be they in the office or in any running government, once you choose to be in, you have to be smarter than the others. Blaming others is a weak option.
Political failure cry foul, this is familiar isn’t it?
We talk about the greatness of world leaders but who can still remember those who goes against them, the political failure?
In politics is not the same as like the Chan’s neighbourhood where you not happy you bring your neighbour to court.
From my recollection when this story broke, Mr Fernandez’ decision to sue was also on the basis of loss of income. I am assuming that this is a reference to the loss of income during his incarceration when he would have ordinarily been supporting his family financially instead.
However, a particularly Singaporean twist to this is that in all likelihood, Mr Fernandez also experienced a loss of income sunsequent to his release. We all know of the stigmatization that is likely to have followed him after his release.
Look no further than the Dr Chees, Chee Siok Chins and Gandhi Ambalams to be convinced of this.
or for more documentary evidence, we could look at the letter that JBJ’s sons had sent to GCT expressing their employment situation.
Fernandez hould sue for more than the loss of income during his detention.
Robox
For your subsequent comments and query per Constituition of Malaysia, that would be in the eyes of beholder for the 1st instance and too speculative.
As per those who espouse liberalism, everything refers to context at the time.
For your disagreeing with my initial statement, may I point out in a unitary state , there is no separation of instituitions under a independent polity.
the main issue is separation of powers and the degrees of separation between the executive, law making and judiciary.
regards
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