The National Environment Agency (NEA) on Sunday (21 June) said that no fine has been issued so far to the members of the Progress Singapore Party (PSP) over alleged breach of safe distancing measures during their walkabout yesterday.
It was earlier reported that six PSP members and a reporter from The Straits Times (ST) had their details taken down by a safe distancing officer due to alleged non-compliance of safe distancing measures during their walkabout at Block 358 Bukit Batok West Street 31 yesterday.
The safe distancing officer claimed that he received a complain from a member of the public saying that the group was gathered at a coffee shop near the area, adding that the group had exceeded the limitation of five people per group.
The PSP members, however, denied the allegation. The Party noted that the group sat separately, adding that it has never assembled more than five people at once.
The NEA told Channel News Asia that it was alerted to the incident, and further clarified that the personnel who had taken down the details is “not an NEA staff (member)”.
“He is a community volunteer with NEA, who has been trained as an SG Clean Ambassador,” NEA stated.
While looking into the circumstances of the case, including whether there was a violation of safe distancing measures as reported, NEA noted that “no fine has been issued so far.”
Gigene Wong, one of the six PSP members who had their particulars taken down, was one the first slate of candidates introduced by the Party on Thursday (18 June).
TOC in its earlier coverage of PSP’s walkabout at Chua Chu Kang GRC noticed that while the groups of the political party are kept to five people by its own social distancing duty officer. The various media personnel covering the walkabout will inevitably increase the groups’ size beyond five – something which is outside of the party’s control.