Singapore — Dr Lee Wei Ling has described as “spot on” a Facebook post on Mr Lee Kuan Yew’s wills by lawyer and opposition politician Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss.
The post was written in the wee hours of Saturday morning (Feb 29), and Dr Lee shared it shortly after.
Ms Chong-Aruldoss had written: “Many things puzzle me. For instance, the DT (Disciplinary Tribunal) said that LSF (Mrs Lee Suet Fern) ‘misled’ LKY into thinking that the Last Will was the 1st Will, when in fact the Last Will was not identical to the 1st Will.”
Mr Lee had seven wills in total, six of which were apparently prepared by lawyer Kwa Kim Li (KKL).
Ms Chong-Aruldoss added that the Last Will differed from the 1st Will in only two ways. The 1st Will had a Gift Over Clause — a clause which provided for the scenario when any of Mr Lee’s children predeceased him — but the Last Will did not contain any Gift Over Clause.
Secondly, she wrote: “The 1st Will had a proviso allowing LWL (Dr Lee) to live in 38 Oxley ‘for so long as she desires free of rent’ and that LHL (Mr Lee Hsien Loong) ‘shall pay for the maintenance and upkeep of 38 Oxley Road when (LWL) is in occupation thereof’. The Last Will also had the proviso allowing LWL to live in 38 Oxley ‘for so long as she desires’ — but the words ‘free of rent’ and that LHL ‘shall pay for the maintenance and upkeep of 38 Oxley Road when (LWL) is in occupation thereof’ were curiously omitted from the Last Will.”
She added: “I cannot see those two differences as pointing to any sinister motives on the part of LSF. I think it would be ridiculous to say that LSF deliberately revised the 1st Will to make those two changes. I would rule that out completely.”
“In view of what the two differences between the 1st Will and the Last Will actually amounted to, I think it is over-enthusiastic for anyone to invoke the spectre of dishonesty to say that LSF ‘misled’ or ‘misrepresented’ to LKY that the draft Last Will was the same as the 1st Will,” Ms Chong-Aruldoss wrote. /TISG