Singapore — The Workers’ Party issued a media statement shortly before noon on Tuesday (Dec 7) in response to a Facebook post from former WP MP Yaw Shin Leong.
The WP denied that former secretary-general Low Thia Khiang and chairwoman Sylvia Lim had advised Mr Yaw to stay silent concerning allegations against him in 2012.
“Mr Low and Ms Lim categorically state that they did not advise Mr Yaw to stay silent. In fact, he was summoned to appear before the Workers’ Party CEC to account for the matter, but chose not to do so,” wrote MP Leon Perera (Aljunied GRC), WP’s Media Chair. 
On Dec 6, Mr Yaw, who also goes by the name Amos Rao and is based overseas, refuted in his post a statement made by WP secretary-general Pritam Singh in a Dec 2 press conference.
In January 2012, it was alleged that the twice-married Mr Yaw, who had won the single seat at Hougang the year before, was having an affair with another party member, who was also married. Another report surfaced that he was romantically involved with a teacher from China.
Mr Yaw posted a YouTube video of the WP chief saying “Yaw Shin Leong did not account himself to the party after the allegations were made. I think he did not address the media, did not address the party… this just went on and it went on, to a point where it was unreasonable conduct and this was not acceptable. And so, the party took the decision to fire him, to sack him.”
Mr Yaw wrote, “The above is not true.”
He explained that he “accounted the situation candidly” to Mr Low even before the allegations of his affairs had surfaced, and when they did, he “immediately accounted to both WP Secretary-General LTK and Chairman Sylvia Lim.
And I was advised to stay silent.
I placed party first before self and to minimize the fallout, I kept silent and resigned from WP CEC. My intention was to give WP CEC a blank cheque to paint the narrative required. To facilitate the process, I travelled out of Singapore voluntarily.”
Adding that he had been expelled from the party on Feb 14, 2012, for “breaking the faith, trust & expectations of the party and people,” he wrote that he is “okay with this narrative, but I am not okay with what Pritam said, for I did account myself.”
The former MP ended his post by writing that he will not be answering questions from the media.
This is the second time in three days that the WP released a statement concerning its former MPs.
On Sunday night (Dec 5), the party issued a statement addressing the release of the interim report by the Parliamentary Committee of Privileges late on Friday evening (Dec 3), which had been formed after a complaint had been filed regarding former WP MP Raeesah Khan’s breach of parliamentary privilege.
The WP noted that the report had been released “without having taken the evidence of Workers’ Party leaders against whom serious allegations have been made.” /TISG