GIVE.asia, an online fundraising portal deleted a fund-raising campaign for the legal action undertaken by Benjamin Lim’s family against the Ministry of Education and Singapore Police Force after receiving complaints from its community.
There had been no notification of the deletion and the deletion was only made known to the family after screenshots of the deleted campaign was shared to them. There was also no account of what happened to the amount that was pledged by members of the public.
After repeated queries to GIVE.asia on Friday, it responded:
The fundraising page was stopped because we received several notifications from our community and after reviewing it, deemed it in conflict with our terms of use.
At the time the page closed, the amount collected was SGD 2,135.00.
All the money collected on this page will be refunded to the various donors directly back to the credit card bank accounts.
Thanks for your understanding.
In its about page, GIVE.asia writes, “GIVE.asia helps patients with hospital bills and enables children to study in rural areas. GIVE.asia help event organisers raise fund for causes. GIVE.asia provides support for humanitarian effort for countries in need. GIVE.asia is a movement for human kindness.”
Family launches legal action to make sure son’s death not in vain
14 year old Benjamin passed away on 26 January 2016, the same day he was taken to Ang Mo Kio Police Division from North View Secondary School ( unaccompanied by any adult from his family or school ) during school hours for questioning in relation to an alleged offence . He was brought back home on the same day by his mother and Sister after spending more than three hours in the police station where he underwent interrogation, and jumped from height to his death after a call was made by the School Counselor to his mother later that afternoon.
The family explains to media the reason why they are initiating a legal action against the said entities, “We feel as parents that the circumstances of the death of our son were not adequately handled or settled by the authorities involved. The outcome we received in no way protects the children of Singapore and we hope that legal action can create the changes needed to protect all our young people in the future.”
Further in response to queries on why the family sought to initiate legal action after one and half year since the death of their son, they wrote, “Our son Benjamin was 14 years old when he died, today he would be 16. Every birthday, every CNY, every family gathering we grieve his absence which is accompanied by a prescient fact that this could happen again today to another set of parents; another family could feel the tragic loss of their child due to our authorities choosing not to learn from Benjamin’s death, and use the lessons learned to progress their systems and protect vulnerable children of Singapore. We are not a wealthy family. To get the legal advice needed to get us to this stage has cost thousands already, a sum that we have had to save and amass over the past year or so. We are now ready with the legal and community support to continue in our effort to make sure that Benjamin’s death was not in vain and that although we are powerless now to help Benjamin, we do have the power to make sure that other Singaporean children are better protected.”
A new online fundraising campaign has been created at Pozible, for those who wish to donate via credit/debit card, you can visit this link https://pozible.com/project/legal-suit-of-benjamins-family. For anyone who wish to contribute via direct banking, you may transfer any amount to POSB saving account 421-54167-1. This account was recently set up by the family to gather funds for the purpose above stated.
