Bloomberg's lawyer denies Shanmugam was targeted in article

SINGAPORE – The lawyer defending Bloomberg in an ongoing defamation trial said on April 8 that an article it ran on high-value property transactions was not targeted at Coordinating Minister for National Security K. Shanmugam.

Senior Counsel N. Sreenivasan contended that good class bungalow (GCB) transactions are routinely reported by mainstream media, and that issues relating to landed properties are a matter of public interest in Singapore.

The lawyer cited a few high-profile GCB transactions that were reported in The Straits Times.

They include the sale of a Cluny Hill bungalow that was owned by Dr Lee Wei Ling, daughter of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew, to Mr Shi Yonghong, the co-founder of hotpot chain Haidilao, for $50 million.

He also cited the sale of a bungalow in Nassim Road to the wife of the founder of Nanofilm Technologies International, a local nanotechnology solutions company.

Ms Jin Xiao Qun had bought the property from businesswoman Oei Siu Hoa, also known as Sukmawati Widjaja, for $128.8 million.

During cross-examination in the High Court trial, Mr Shanmugam, who is also Home Affairs Minister, agreed that such transactions are sometimes reported, but added that one would have to look at the context of each deal.

He added that he could not recall a transaction being reported a year after it took place.

Mr Shanmugam and Manpower Minister Tan See Leng have sued Bloomberg and the reporter who authored the article, Mr Low De Wei, over the Dec 12, 2024, piece on GCB transactions, headlined “Singapore mansion deals are increasingly shrouded in secrecy”.

The article mentioned the ministers’ property deals that took place in 2023 – Mr Shanmugam’s sale of his former home in the Queen Astrid Park area to UBS Trustees for $88 million, and Dr Tan’s purchase of a bungalow in Brizay Park for nearly $27.3 million.

Mr Sreenivasan questioned Mr Shanmugam’s earlier testimony that the property transaction was a private matter.

He highlighted that the Residential Property Act, which imposes restrictions on foreign ownership of landed property, is quite stringent so that property prices do not go out of control in land-scarce Singapore.

The lawyer added that it is also a matter of interest to Singaporeans if new citizens enter the market for such properties.

Mr Shanmugam said that it is a matter of public policy that landed properties are restricted to Singaporeans, adding: “When you say new citizens, do you have a timeline, how new?”

Mr Sreenivasan replied: “Five years or people who did not grow up in Singapore.”

When he added that the article referred to “a lot of purchases by new citizens”, Mr Shanmugam said in response that it referred to “a number of people said to be foreign-born”.

The minister reiterated what he said on the first day of the trial – that Bloomberg had lied to his press secretary, Ms Ng Siew Hua, about the reasons for the article.

Mr Shanmugam said that the publication’s news employees in Singapore had also not been completely transparent with their management outside of the country. 

Over the past two days, Mr Shanmugam has made the point that e-mail exchanges at Bloomberg showed that the article was an indirect way of targeting him by writing about the sale of his property.

On April 7, the first day of the trial, he said that despite Bloomberg’s claim that the sale was part of a broader story on property transactions, internal e-mails at the publication showed they were lying about their intentions.

He cited one e-mail by a journalist who said a story about Mr Shanmugam selling his GCB would “strike a nerve”.

Mr Shanmugam on April 8 said he believed the intention to target him arose around March 2024, based on the dates of the e-mails.

Mr Sreenivasan sought to poke holes in his testimony by referring the minister to what he said was the “first draft” of the article, dated Aug 23, 2024, and asked if his property sale was mentioned.

Mr Shanmugam’s lawyer, Senior Counsel Davinder Singh, pointed out: “This is by no means a draft.”

Mr Singh said the two-page document was just a summary of the points that Mr Low wanted to make in persuading his supervisor to let him write the article.

Mr Sreenivasan then referred to two other so-called drafts, including one that made reference to Mr Shanmugam, Dr Tan and former minister Mah Bow Tan. The lawyer asked: “Do you agree that no fair-minded reader is going to form the view that these were written with you as the target?”

Mr Singh interjected, saying that this was an issue for the court to decide based on the final version seen by readers.

Mr Shanmugam replied: “On the face of this document, I would have questions whether we are being targeted but I would not have come to a conclusion.

“But having seen the e-mails, I would come to the conclusion.”

When Mr Sreenivasan put it to him that the e-mails did not show that he was being targeted, Mr Shanmugam said: “I disagree completely.”

Mr Shanmugam also noted that despite receiving a correction directive from the Government stating that the article contained falsehoods, Bloomberg chose not to take the article down. He said that while Bloomberg was entitled to do so, this showed its intentions and amounted to malice.

In their suits, the ministers contended that the article was understood to falsely mean that they had taken advantage of there being no checks and balances or disclosure requirements, to carry out their property deals in a non-transparent manner.

The article was also understood to falsely mean that they wanted to hide their transactions and avoid scrutiny, including about the possibility of money laundering, the ministers asserted.

Bloomberg and Mr Low contended that the article was not defamatory, and that they were exercising responsible journalism to report on a matter of public interest.

The trial continues on April 9.

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This article was first published in The Straits Times. Permission required for reproduction.