The trial involving Workers’ Party (WP) chief Pritam Singh resumed on Friday (18 Oct), at 9:30 a.m., with Singh facing two charges of lying to a parliamentary committee.

These charges stem from alleged false statements made by Singh about his actions following former WP Member of Parliament (MP) Raeesah Khan’s 2021 admission that she had lied in Parliament about accompanying a rape victim to a police station.

Testifying as prosecution witnesses were two former WP cadre members, Loh Peiying and Yudhishthra Nathan, both of whom had served on the Committee of Privileges, the parliamentary body that investigated Khan’s lie. The Committee’s findings ultimately led to the current charges against Singh.

Raeesah Khan’s false statement and party concerns

Nathan took the stand following the completion of Loh’s examination as a witness in the afternoon.

A WP member for six years until his resignation in 2022, Nathan had served on the party’s media team, advising Khan on social media and speeches.

He was described as articulate in his responses to questions from Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Sivakumar Ramasamy, although his rapid pace of speaking led to several reminders to slow down for transcription accuracy.

At one point, the public gallery giggled when he was again asked to speak more slowly.

During his testimony, Nathan disclosed the behind-the-scenes efforts to manage the situation after Khan’s lie became known to the party.

He recounted that Khan first confided in him during a Zoom meeting on 7 August 2021, admitting that her parliamentary anecdote was fabricated.

Although Nathan sympathised with Khan’s admission of being sexually assaulted, he expressed greater concern for the WP.

He testified, “It was clear to me that her lie was going to become an issue, or rather, a problem.”

Nathan also detailed a conversation with Khan on 3 August 2021, shortly after her false statement in Parliament.

According to Nathan, Khan told him that Singh had asked her for further details about the incident she had mentioned.

Nathan advised Khan that it might be difficult to verify her story due to confidentiality issues related to the victim.

Khan’s “take it to the grave” message and Nathan’s interpretation

A key piece of evidence discussed during Nathan’s testimony was a message Khan sent to a group chat on 8 August 2021.

In the message, Khan said, “I told them what I told you guys… take the information to the grave.”

Nathan explained that while Khan used this specific phrasing, he believed she was referring to instructions from senior WP leaders, including Singh, Sylvia Lim, and Faisal Manap, to bury the truth.

When asked about his view on this,  Nathan testified that “As far as party leaders were concerned, this issue of her having lied in Parliament was essentially something the party didn’t need to address.”

“And based on the rest of the message, that the focus was now on Muslim issues and having to address that.”

Meetings with Pritam Singh and delayed action on the lie

Nathan provided further testimony about a meeting on 10 August 2021, attended by Singh and Loh Peiying.

They discussed Khan’s falsehood and her experience as a sexual assault victim.

Nathan recalled Singh remarking that conservative religious men in Singapore might react poorly to an MP who had been sexually assaulted.

Despite these discussions, Nathan testified that no action was taken to correct the lie before the next parliamentary session on 4 October 2021, when Khan repeated her false statement.

DPP Ramasamy asked if any steps were taken to address the issue between 10 August and the October session. Nathan confirmed that none had been.

Message deletions and concerns about external surveillance

Nathan also spoke about the deletion of several messages from the group chat between himself, Khan, and Loh on 4 October 2021.

He explained that this was due to concerns that external parties might access their communications.

“There was concern that some external force or party would be able to read these messages if, for example, Raeesah Khan’s phone had been hacked,” Nathan testified.

He also described an atmosphere of fear within the WP during this period, with phones switched off and stored outside meeting rooms due to concerns about surveillance.

Nathan also testified that their phones had to be kept outside the office when they met the disciplinary panel.

Uncertain about whether Khan should maintain the lie or publicly admit the truth

When asked whether he was aware of any plans for Khan to publicly clarify the truth after that session, Nathan responded, “Not at all, not until 12 October.”

Nathan explained that during the period between 4 and 12 October, he, Loh Pei Ying, and Khan were uncertain about whether she should maintain the lie or publicly admit the truth.

“Between Oct 4 and the end of Oct 12, my own position – and essentially that of Loh Pei Ying’s and Raeesah Khan’s as well – we were vacillating between whether she should maintain the lie and keep to the party position, or whether she should come clean in some way,” Nathan testified.

He added that while he and Loh both thought Khan should eventually come clean, they had varying degrees of conviction about when and how it should happen.

Nathan also expressed concerns about the potential consequences for WP if Khan admitted her falsehood.

He explained that after the 4 October Parliament sitting, they were fearful of the damage that coming clean might cause to the WP’s reputation.

“We were afraid of what coming clean would mean for the reputation of the Workers’ Party,” he said, noting that he and Loh were loyal members of the party at the time, despite how others might perceive them now.

When asked to clarify the specific fears he and Loh had, Nathan said they were worried that the party’s reputation would suffer irreparable damage if Khan admitted her lie.

He added, “We had these fears at a time when we were, one might say, operating in an environment where the party leader’s position was that she should still not have come clean.”

“Not give too many details” message

Referring to the message that Nathan sent to Khan on 4 October 2021 where he advised, “In the first place, I think we should just not give too many details, at most apologise for the fact of not having her age accurate.”

This message was among those redacted from documents submitted to the Committee of Privileges.

DPP Ramasamy asked Nathan to clarify the meaning behind this message.

Nathan explained that he was suggesting that Khan go to Parliament and clarify some inaccuracies in her initial story, such as the victim’s age.

He noted that he and others within the party had been vacillating between 4 and 12 October about whether Khan should fully admit her lie or continue with the fabricated story.

Nathan elaborated that the message was sent after a phone call with Khan earlier that day and before he and Loh met with Singh later that night.

He expressed doubts about whether Singh or the other WP leaders were prepared to manage the media response to the situation.

“At that point in time, I was not confident that Pritam Singh would have been able, or the party leaders would be able, to deal with the media side of this whole situation properly,” Nathan testified.

He added that the leaders had also been uncertain about whether Khan should disclose her experience of sexual assault, further complicating the decision-making process.

When DPP Ramasamy inquired about the intent behind the message, Nathan acknowledged that it was intended to advise Khan to continue with the lie, aligning with the party leader’s position at the time.

However, Nathan noted that Khan did not follow his suggestion, and he did not raise the plan with Singh or Sylvia Lim.

Redacted message because they were ‘immaterial’ to investigation

Nathan was questioned about his decision to redact certain messages from a group chat involving himself, Khan, and Loh, which were submitted as evidence to the COP in 2021.

DPP Ramasamy specifically inquired about an October 12 message in which Nathan wrote, “I think we should just not give too many details,” and why he chose to exclude it from the submission.

Nathan explained that he had been informed by “a couple of committee members” that it was acceptable to redact information he deemed irrelevant or immaterial to the investigation.

He believed the message in question, sent after Khan had made her second false statement in Parliament on 4 October 2021, was not pertinent to the COP’s inquiry.

According to Nathan, by the end of that day, the three members of the chat had agreed that Khan should come clean about her lies.

He further elaborated that, in his view, the COP was primarily interested in matters such as how party leaders treated Khan and how she was expelled from the WP.

Additionally, the committee was concerned with Khan’s state of mind during these events, particularly since party leaders had been involved in discussions as early as August, prior to her second false statement.

When DPP Ramasamy asked whether Nathan had any other concerns about the redacted message beyond its irrelevance, Nathan reiterated that he felt the message was simply not relevant to the investigations.

He maintained that his decision to omit the message was based on its lack of material significance to the COP’s focus.

Nathan redacted messages by himself in his car at the carpark

Nathan explained the process by which he redacted certain messages before submitting evidence to the COP.

Nathan began redacting the messages after providing his testimony to the COP on 2 December 2021. He testified that he initially reviewed the messages while sitting in the Parliament library next to MP Rahayu Mahzam.

Together, they went through the extracted messages from his phone, and Nathan recalled needing to provide a reason for each message he wished to redact.

However, when Rahayu had to leave and the library was closing, Nathan was told to complete the redactions on his own and email the final version to the committee.

He ended up continuing the redaction process in his car at a carpark.

DPP Sivakumar Ramasamy asked Nathan whether anyone had approved the redactions he made in his car.

Nathan confirmed that no one had approved them.

DPP Ramasamy then specifically inquired whether the redaction of the message where Nathan had advised Raeesah Khan to “just not give too many details” had been authorised.

Nathan responded that he could not remember.

“To be honest, I cannot remember,” Nathan said. He explained that he could not recall where MP Rahayu had left off in their review of the messages, adding, “There were hundreds of messages we were looking at, so I can’t remember.”

12 October meeting and Singh’s concerns about the government

Nathan further testified about a meeting on 12 October 2021, where Singh, Loh, and Nathan discussed whether Khan should admit the truth.

Nathan recounted that Singh appeared worried that the government might already know the full details of Khan’s lie or would soon uncover it.

“My sense at the time was that he was very afraid of Minister K. Shanmugam and the Government,” Nathan said.

According to him, Singh raised concerns about the party’s reputation and “bad karma” if they continued to conceal the lie.

Nathan also testified that Singh had consulted former WP secretary-general Low Thia Khiang, who advised that Khan should come clean “as soon as possible.”

The drafting of Khan’s personal statement, delivered on 1 November 2021, involved input from Nathan, Loh, and a public relations expert.

Nathan noted that it took about two weeks to finalise the statement.

Raeesah Khan’s role post-admission and Singh’s indecision

The 12 October meeting also addressed Khan’s future role as an MP. Nathan testified that it was suggested she step back from parliamentary speeches and focus on constituency work to rebuild trust.

He agreed with this approach, citing MP Tin Pei Ling as a positive example of someone who matured after initial public missteps.

Nathan also revealed that Singh told Khan during a visit to her home on 3 October that he would not judge her, regardless of her decision to admit the lie or maintain it.

Nathan described Singh’s stance as indecisive, though he did not express this to Singh at the time.

The trial is set to continue on Monday, with Singh’s lawyer, Andre Jumabhoy, expected to cross-examine Nathan. Former WP secretary-general Low Thia Khiang is also anticipated to testify this week.