SINGAPORE – The Singaporean who had a heart attack and lapsed into a coma in Tokyo just over a week ago is due to arrive in Singapore on Tuesday (May 2).

The team from EMA Global, the medical assistance company appointed for the evacuation, has left Singapore for Tokyo, a spokesman for EMA Global told The Straits Times on Monday (May 1).

His 25-year-old daughter, Ms Eileen Cheong, had successfully raised $250,000 on fundraising platform Give.Asia to get her father home to Singapore.

She wrote in her campaign that her family had flown to Tokyo on April 19 to celebrate her mother’s cancer remission when her father had a heart attack.

He was resuscitated and admitted to the Intensive Care Unit at Toho University Omori Medical Center on the same day and placed on mechanical support.

Japanese doctors told her family that they could not determine how long her father would stay in a coma.

Ms Cheong wrote that her dad’s travel insurers MSIG informed her family that they were “unlikely to have a successful claim as his collapse was attributable to a pre-existing heart condition”.

The 25-year-old, who is a fresh graduate earning less than $3,000 a month, turned to crowdfunding to get her father home.

And the Internet delivered – raising enough through Give.Asia and privately to get Ms Cheong’s father medically evacuated.

The Straits Times tried to contact Ms Cheong but she has declined comment.

A spokesman for EMA Global, however, told ST that the team bringing Ms Cheong’s father home consist of a doctor and a nurse who are trained in critical care and have extensive experience in aero-medical missions.

The air ambulance deployed has the range to fly Ms Cheong’s father from Haneda Airport to Seletar Airport without any fuel stops, and is equipped with an ICU ventilator, multiple modular monitors and infusion pumps.

The team will visit Ms Cheong’s dad in the Tokyo hospital and prepare him for the flight, ensuring he is stable before shifting him into an ambulance.

The team, which is scheduled to land in Singapore on Tuesday, will be met by an ambulance on the tarmac in Singapore, which will then transfer Ms Cheong’s dad to hospital.

Ms Cheong had said in a campaign update on Friday (April 30) that her father was in stable condition. She thanked all contributors and donors and promised to post an update on the situation soon.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had previously told ST that it was aware of the incident and that the Singapore Embassy in Tokyo was rendering the necessary consular assistance to the family.

Additional reporting by Toh Wen Li

This article was first published on May 1, 2017.
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The identities of the couple who bullied an old man in a hawker centre at Block 210, Toa Payoh Lorong 8 and was subsequently arrested, have been revealed: The 39-year-old woman, works as a mathematics tutor at a institution, while the 46-year-old man, her husband, is a shareholder, and director of the same tuition centre.

The couple had come under the spotlight after a video of the two surfaced online last Friday (April 21), in which the woman was first seen arguing with the elderly man who wanted to share a seat at their table.

The two came to an impasse, when the woman’s husband suddenly shoved the old man from behind.

After the incident came to light, the couple came under heavy flak from netizens and were subsequently arrested for causing public nuisance.

The woman has 16 years of teaching experience, and has taught at primary schools and tuition centres, reports Lianhe Zaobao.

She started working at said tuition centre in 2011.

Furthermore, information retrieved from the website of the tuition centre listed the woman’s subject of speciality as premium mathematics, and a large percentage of her students scored ‘A’s in their PSLE examinations under her tutelage.

The tuition centre was started in May, 2011 by the man and two other partners.

He also serves as the director of a higher learning institute and a renovation company.

When reporters from Lianhe Zaobao interviewed the woman earlier, she told them that she was a manager in the tuition centre.

However, when reporters browsed the website yesterday, they discovered that information about the woman had been taken down.

A male relative of the woman told Lianhe Zaobao that the couple had met each other while travelling and had been together for more than ten years before getting married in Malaysia.

According to the relative, the woman is a Singaporean, while her husband is a Permanent Resident (PR), and a former Malaysian.

The relative also told reporters that the couple had previously stayed with him.

During their stay, the two employed a domestic helper at the time, who often quarrelled with said relative.

After the woman took the side of the helper during a fight, the relative, in a fit of anger, evicted the couple and their helper.

He said he only realised that the couple had been arrested after hearing it from other relatives.

When reporters visited the new address of the couple last Saturday (April 29), a slim man answered the door, but denied that he was the man in the video.

He then became impatient and shut the door before reporters could press on further.

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