A group of 52 academics from universities around the world have issued a letter to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, urging him to drop the case against independent regional journalism outlet New Naratif and to reform the country’s Parliamentary Elections Act, specifically to narrow its scope and protect media freedom.
On 18 September, the Elections Department (ELD) under the Prime Minister’s Office issues a press statement saying that the Assistant Returning Officer (ARO) had filed a police report against New Naratif, alleging that it had published “paid advertisements that amounted to the illegal conduct of election activity under s83(2) of the Parliamentary Elections Act (PEA) during the recent 2020 General Election.”
The ARO had issued three notices to Facebook on 3 July, 7 July and 8 July 2020 to remove five unauthorised paid advertisements published on its platform by New Naratif.
New Naratif condemned the police report made against it as a politically motivated attack on freedom of expression and described it as harassment.
You can read the letter to PM Lee from the group of academics here, in full:
Dear Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong,
We write as academic experts on Southeast Asia to express our dismay at your government’s treatment of New Naratif and its founder, Dr Thum Ping Tjin.
We consider New Naratif to be an important and innovative contribution to Southeast Asia’s media landscape. Free discussion of social and political issues is essential for a healthy society and to allow political leaders to respond to the concerns of the people.
Singapore’s media freedom is already limited in many ways, and the use of the Parliamentary Election Act to harass New Naratif will only restrict it further.
We urge you to drop the case against New Naratif and to reform the Parliamentary Elections Act to narrow its scope and protect media freedom.
Yours sincerely,
Dr Lee Jones, Queen Mary University of London
Dr Ryan Pesigan Reyes, Centro Escolar University
Dr Charan Bal, University of Western Australia
Dr Nicholas Harrigan, Macquarie University
David Kloos, Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian & Caribbean Studies
Prof Kanishka Jayasuriya, Murdoch University
Dr Agnes Khoo, Independent Scholar
Netusha Naidu, University of Cambridge
Dr Adrian Heok, Asia Development Alliance
Dr Tom Hoogervorst, KITLV
Lorraine Yang, University of Leeds
Dr E Kramer, University of Sydney
Prof Garry Rodan, University of Queensland
Dr Philip Kreager, Oxford University
Dr Jori Breslawski, Brown University
Prof Emeritus Francis Loh Kok Wah, Universiti Sains Malaysia
Associate Professor Anthony J. Langlois, Flinders University
Dr Sol Iglesias, Independent Researcher
Dr Michael Buehler, SOAS, University of London
Dr Jay Koh, iFIMA
Dr Jessica Soedirgo, Georgetown University
Dr Chong Wu Ling, University of Malaya
Prof Thomas Pepinsky, Cornell University
Prof Linda Lim, University of Michigan
Bill Hayton, Royal Institute for International Affairs
Prof Emeritus Henk Schulte Nordholt, Leiden University
Dr Roger Montgomery, London School of Economics
Dr Dorothy Guyot, Yale University
Dr P R Preston, Lithoscapes Archaeological Research Foundation
Prof Meredith Weiss, University at Albany, SUNY
Dr Carlo Bonura, SOAS, University of London
Dr Marc Rerceretnam
Dr Robert Yates, University of Bristol
Prof Paul Joseph Lim
Prof Kevin Hewison, UNC-Chapel Hill
Prof Adriaan Bedner, Leiden University
Anne Booth SOAS, University of London
Associate Professor Shahar Hameiri, University of Queensland
Howard Lee, Murdoch University
Prof Emeritus Thongchai Winichakul, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Prof James C. Scott, Yale University
Dr Sikko Visscher, KILTV
Dr Bridget Welsh, University of Nottingham Malaysia
Sebastian Strangio, The Diplomat
Dr Charlie Thame, Thammasat University
Prof Lily Z. Rahim, Georgetown University and Monash University Malaysia
Dr Michael Magcamit, Queen Mary University of London
Dr Nicola Suyin Pocock, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
Prof Edmund Terence Gomez, University of Malaya
Dr Scott Edwards, University of Bristol
Winnifred Wong, National University of Singapore
Dr Show Ying Xin, Australian National University
