SG man & Vietnamese wife each fined S$3,500 for lying to ICA about living together; man charged woman S$1K monthly marriage fee

SINGAPORE: A couple has been slapped with a substantial fine, with each needing to pay S$3,500 after the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) discovered that they lied on their immigration declarations.

The man, Singaporean Lim Kok Guan, 45, and his Vietnamese wife, Phan Thi Nhan, 27, told the ICA that they were living together at his home at Bukit Batok West Avenue 8 after they got married in 2022.

They resorted to falsehood in order for Phan to have a long-term visit pass, a report in Shin Min Daily News said.

In reality, however, the two only lived together for a few days after their wedding ceremony in November 2022. Shortly after they were legally wed, Phan moved in with her sister.

The problem was that Lim found out that Phan had been unfaithful to him. The two, then, had a major argument. However, because Phan expressed reluctance “to go home”, Lim asked her to pay him S$1,000 a month as a “marriage fee”.

Their falsehood was discovered in 2024, which resulted in the arrest of both Lim and Phan. On Friday (Sep 12), they individually entered guilty pleas to one charge of violating an immigration act.

The couple met in 2021, and Phan asked Lim to marry her the following year. They hardly lived together, however, and after Phan moved in with her sister, she only stayed with Lim one to two days a week.

Last year, Phan discovered she was pregnant with Lim’s child, but the two continued to live apart. She preferred to stay with relatives instead, at a rented flat in Geylang.

In October 2024, Lim applied for the renewal of Phan’s Long-Term Visit Pass, falsely telling the ICA that they lived together. However, when the authority carried out a surprise inspection, they learned that the couple had lied on the application.

Lim and Phan had also said in their declaration to ICA that she had never been banned from entering the city-state, when in fact, she had been banned in 2016. She was able to appeal the ban in 2017.

Netizens commenting on news reports concerning Lim and Phan’s story commended the ICA for a job well done, although a number of social media users expressed concern over the couple’s child, given the couple’s unusual situation, not to mention the falsehoods told by Lim and Phan.

“In the end, the baby suffers,” one wrote. /TISG

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