Local activist Jolovan Wham is under investigation again for allegedly protesting outside the State Courts. All Wham did was to hold up a piece of A4-sized paper that read: "Drop the charges against Terry Xu and Daniel De Costa" and take a photo of himself. He left the place almost immediately.
Angry at being investigated again, Wham accused the mainstream media and police for publishing fake news and "mischaracterising" him. According to the mainstream media, Wham had applied for a permit to stage a protest outside the State Courts but was rejected. It reported that he went ahead despite being told otherwise. However, the said application was actually for an event on 10 Dec 2018 - separate from the one where he simply held a piece of A4-sized paper.
"The current investigation is for a photo I had taken on December 13 and has nothing to do with the human rights day event I tried to obtain a permit for. For the police to mention my application of this event together with the photo I took on December 13 is misleading."
Wham also said that he was never informed that the State Courts is a prohibited area for protest. Nevertheless, he maintained that he did not mean for it to be one. Instead, he merely wanted to show solidarity for his friends.
He criticised the Singapore government for depriving citizens of the chance to peaceful assembly and defended that having one person alone does not constitute an "assembly".
"Singapore cannot call itself a developed nation and a democracy if it continues to crack down on peaceful acts where even a photo op is criminalised... It is mind boggling that investigations for this were initiated and my personal mobile phone was confiscated for an action which did not cause any harm."
What an alarmist culture. The Singapore government should not attack citizens at every chance it gets as it just makes them look petty and immature. Same goes for our mainstream media. Go on, they can continue to be in denial and think that Singaporeans still have faith in them. We'll see who laughs at the end.
