Two brothers clashed over a will left by their late mother that would have given the beneficiary greater control over the family business empire.

Mr Girish Patel, 65, argued that the will, from 2005, was valid. It named him as the sole executor and beneficiary of Mrs Prabhavati Patel’s estate.

The estate included her late husband’s assets, which were transferred to her after he died without a will.

But Dr Yashwant Patel, 70, alleged that Girish fabricated the will to secure control of the assets. He said that an earlier will from 1986, anointing him the sole executor and beneficiary, was valid.

Mrs Patel – who had two other sons, Rajnikant, 72, and Suresh, 64 – died in London in September 2011.

Recently, a London court held that the 2005 will was forged and ruled that the 1986 will was valid.

The legal tussle between Girish and Yashwant was part of a long-running and acrimonious court fight among the four siblings over control of the family business empire, which the judge noted might be worth US$200 million (S$282 million).

The court found that Girish had influenced two others – Ms Ranjanbala Patel and Ms Jayshree Patel – to both “falsely” witness the will, which was forged on blank papers signed in advance by Mrs Patel.

“I am not able to attach any weight to the account of events given by Girish, Ranjanbala and Jayshree except to the extent they are reliably corroborated by other evidence,” wrote English High Court Deputy Judge Andrew Simmonds, in decision grounds issued last month.

Mrs Patel had lived in Singapore with Suresh and his family in the 40 years leading up to her death. Her husband, Mr D. P. Patel – who came to Singapore with her in the early 1950s and started a commodities business – died in 1992.

The family business continued to thrive and now operates on a global scale through several corporate vehicles, including the Aumkar Plantations in Malaysia, Barrowfen Properties in Britain and Australian company Agromin, which trades in pulses and grains.

Although Mrs Patel lived in Singapore with Suresh, she regularly visited her three other sons in the United States, Australia and Britain.

Girish claimed that it was during a 2005 visit to London, where he lived, that she made the will naming him the sole executor and beneficiary of her estate.

He claimed that Mrs Patel had signed the will, witnessed by his former employee Ranjanbala and by Jayshree, who was married to his brother-in-law.

Girish said that his mother did not mention she had made a will in 1986 in Yashwant’s favour.

Yashwant, who trained as a doctor in Singapore and is now a New York-based senior radiologist, alleged that Girish fabricated the will to secure control of the assets.

The assets included shares in family companies, registered in Mrs Patel’s name, which would have given him an advantage in ongoing litigation among the brothers over the Patel businesses.

The judge noted that in the proceedings involving the will, Suresh actively supported Yashwant’s case while Rajnikant played no part at all.

He observed that expert evidence was called by both parties on the newer will but “there was no expert evidence which went positively to support Girish’s account of the execution of the will in 2005”.

“I accept Yashwant’s contention that Girish had a strong motive for forging the will,” said Judge Simmonds, in rejecting the document.

When contacted by The Straits Times, Mr Ajaib Haridass, the Singapore lawyer for Yashwant, said: “We are extremely satisfied with the outcome of the judgment.”

vijayan@sph.com.sg

This article was first published on Mar 03, 2017.
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Older public servants who are re-employed at the same job grade will no longer have their salaries cut, Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean said yesterday.

“These officers will continue to receive their last-drawn salary,” said the minister-in-charge of the civil service, adding that the Government recognises the contributions and experience of its older workers.

Its move reflects the practice in most companies now, and is a result of the public service’s latest review of its guidelines for re-employing workers, he said.

Re-employment contracts may be offered to officers who turn 62 up till age 67. About 1,300 officers were re-employed last year.

During the debate on the Prime Minister’s Office budget, Mr Teo also outlined key priorities for the public service.

One of them is driving innovation.

Education Minister (Higher Education and Skills) Ong Ye Kung has been appointed to champion public service innovation and will focus on a number of key areas that require close coordination among agencies.

These include the review of regulations to better support innovation and entrepreneurship, and adopting procurement methods that support industry development.

In all, 24 MPs raised questions, asking about a range of public sector plans, from going digital to employing people with disabilities.

Mr Teo said another priority is to develop skills in IT and engineering in officers.

About 10,000 civil servants will be trained in the next four years in areas such as data analytics, in keeping with the country’s push to go digital.

Such training will help them come up with policies and deliver better services to people, he said.

Developing public officers is another key priority, said Mr Teo, laying out the human resource policy changes in the pipeline.

From July, public officers and pensioners on older medical schemes who are hospitalised at community hospitals will have up to 28 days’ stay covered.

Currently, their medical benefits cover only their stay in restructured hospitals.

The public service will also look at hiring more people with disabilities in meaningful jobs.

In response to Nominated MP Chia Yong Yong, Mr Teo said about 270 disabled people worked in the public service as of the end of last year.

Suitable vacancies are posted on the job portal run by disabilities support agency SG Enable, he added.

Senior public servants are also appointed to champion the hiring and integration of disabled people in their organisations.

This article was first published on Mar 03, 2017.
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Singapore strongly believes that the documents relied on by Malaysia in its bid to overturn a 2008 judgment awarding Pedra Branca to the Republic do not satisfy the criteria under which it applied for a revision.

Its legal team has carefully studied the application that Malaysia filed last month at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), including the three documents it cited to support its bid, Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said yesterday.

“We will submit to the ICJ our comprehensive and compelling rebuttal to Malaysia’s application by June 14, which is the time limit fixed by the ICJ,” he said during the debate on his ministry’s budget. “We are confident of our legal team and our case.”

Read also: ICJ makes public details of Malaysia’s bid to revise 2008 Pedra Branca judgment

He was responding to Parliamentary Secretary for Home Affairs Amrin Amin and Mr Baey Yam Keng (Tampines GRC), who asked about the Pedra Branca case.

Malaysia last month filed an application to revise the 2008 judgment, citing three “new facts” to argue that “Singapore’s officials at the highest levels did not consider that Singapore had acquired sovereignty over Pedra Branca from Johor”.

Read also: Malaysian official on Pedra Branca: We’ll defend borders, keep good ties 

It based its application on Article 61 of the ICJ’s Statute, which provides that an “application for revision of a judgment may be made when it is based only upon the discovery of some fact of such a nature as to be a decisive factor”.

The fact had to be unknown to the court and also to the party claiming revision when the judgment was given.

Read also: MFA: Singapore studying closely KL’s application over Pedra Branca

The request for revision must also be made within six months of discovery of the new fact – in this case, Aug 4, 2016.

Malaysia cited three documents in its application last month. The first is a confidential telegram from Singapore’s top colonial official to the British Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1958, which Malaysia says shows that he “did not consider the island of Pedra Branca to be part of Singaporean territory”.

The second is a report about a naval incident near Pedra Branca.

The third document is a map of naval operations in the Malacca and Singapore straits from 1962.

Malaysia said two of the documents, from the United Kingdom National Archives, were declassified after the 2008 judgment. The third document’s release date is unknown.

The territorial dispute between Singapore and Malaysia had also involved two smaller maritime features, Middle Rocks and South Ledge, near Pedra Branca.

The ICJ, in its 2008 judgment, found that sovereignty over Middle Rocks belongs to Malaysia and sovereignty over South Ledge belongs to the state in the territorial waters of which it is located.

The three features in the Singapore Strait are located about 40km east of the Republic’s main island.

The ICJ had considered correspondence from 1953 between Singapore’s colonial officials and Johor as being of central importance.

Johor’s top official had written in a 1953 letter that “the Johor government does not claim ownership of Pedra Branca”. The court found this showed that while Johor had the original title, “as of 1953, Johor understood that it did not have sovereignty over Pedra Branca”.

Singapore’s legal team on the case includes senior lawyers well- acquainted with the issue. Dr Balakrishnan said Singapore is very fortunate to still have former deputy prime minister and law minister S. Jayakumar, Ambassador-at-Large Tommy Koh and former chief justice Chan Sek Keong – the leading figures in the original team on the Pedra Branca case.

They are working with a younger team of “bright legal minds” in the Attorney-General’s Chambers, to build up expertise and experience in the next generation, he added.

On whether this episode will affect ties with Malaysia, Dr Balakrishnan said bilateral relations are excellent, and mutually beneficial bilateral co-operation will continue.

Singaporeans should not be disconcerted by these developments, he said. “Even with the best of diplomatic and personal relationships, we must expect other states to act in their own self-interests.”

Part of what underpins Singa- pore’s good relations with Malaysia is a commitment by both sides to resolve disagreements amicably, in accordance with international law, while allowing co-operation to continue, he said.

The Foreign Affairs Ministry, in a separate statement yesterday, announced that Singapore has chosen Judge Gilbert Guillaume – a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration who was president of the ICJ from 2000 to 2003 – as a judge ad hoc for the case.

Under the ICJ’s Statute, if there is no judge of the nationality of the parties on the Bench of the Court, the parties may each choose a judge ad hoc who will take part in the decision on the case.

This article was first published on Mar 03, 2017.
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SBS Transit has earned $2,040,000 for improvements to 25 bus services, while SMRT Buses received $1,403,300 for improvements to 20 services.

The incentives were given out as part of a trial “carrot-and-stick” scheme to get public bus operators to improve service reliability and reduce bus bunching.

The money was given for improving the regularity of 45 bus services in all, said Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan on Tuesday, in a written reply to a query about bus reliability filed by MP Liang Eng Hwa.

Read also: New $7.2b bus deals for SBS, SMRT

Mr Khaw said there was a 20 per cent reduction in average additional wait times for the bus services, from December 2015 to August last year.

This is the final assessment period of the Bus Service Reliability Framework (BSRF) pilot, which started in February 2014. From the previous three assessment periods, SBS received about $2.87 million in total, while SMRT got $1.23 million.

Under the BSRF, public bus operators are given monetary incentives for reducing commuters’ excess waiting time, or handed penalties if the waiting time increases.

Read also: LTA rewards $1.34m to SBS Transit and $504k to SMRT for improving bus waiting times

The framework also uses an “On Time Adherence” standard, which measures the proportion of times that the bus service arrives less than two minutes earlier, or five minutes later than its scheduled timing.

The BSRF is incorporated into the bus contracting model, which the bus industry fully transited to last September, and has been implemented for 108 services, resulting in a 15 per cent reduction in average additional wait times, said Mr Khaw.

National University of Singapore transport researcher Lee Der Horng said it was appropriate to raise the BSRF standards to reflect the changing operating environment, which includes an expansion of the bus lane scheme.

From March 21 last year, the Land Transport Authority extended the operating hours of full-day bus lanes by three hours, until 11pm.

This article was first published on Mar 03, 2017.
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Alternative news website All Singapore Stuff was forced to apologise to police yesterday for posting a fake article.

The supposed writer of the article claimed the police had failed to take action after she reported that a male schoolmate had “duped” her into having sex with him when she was 14 years old, and that he later started bullying her.

The writer, who claimed to be a 16-year-old student, gave a police report number to support her story. She further claimed that the police advised her to drop the case as she would be sent to the Girls’ Home, and the schoolmate to the Boys’ Home, after investigations.

The Straits Times (ST) understands that while a police report bearing the same number as the one posted exists, the nature of the report is different.

In a statement to ST on Wednesday, the police said: “The police would like to clarify that the article and allegations against the Singapore Police Force are untrue.”

Not only are the claims false, the writer is also a fake. “A police report has been lodged by a member of the public, whose identity is believed to have been misused as the contributor of the article,” added the police.

They requested that All Singapore Stuff provide information on the contributor, saying they “take a serious view of any allegations against its officers and will investigate each case thoroughly”.

If the allegations are found to be false, the police will take action against the people involved, they said.

All Singapore Stuff has since removed the article, which was published on Wednesday, and put the police statement in full on its Facebook page and website yesterday.

The website said the article had been submitted anonymously and it does not have any details about the contributor.

Last November, the website apologised after posting a fake news article claiming the roof of Punggol Waterway Terraces had collapsed.

Another alternative news website – the now-defunct The Real Singapore – posted a fake news report in 2015 about complaints that caused a scuffle between the police and participants during the Thaipusam procession that year. The husband and wife behind the site were later jailed for eight and 10 months respectively on charges of sedition.

In March last year, Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam criticised socio-political blog The Online Citizen for giving the impression that the police had lied about being in plain clothes when they arrived at a 14-year-old’s school for an investigation, and that the teenager was interviewed and intimidated by five police officers, among other matters.

This article was first published on Mar 03, 2017.
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The money that people pay for using water is enough to cover only the operations of national water agency PUB and the depreciation of its water works, pipelines and water reclamation plants, Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat said yesterday.

The annual surpluses PUB gets are transferred to its reserves to finance its plants and equipment, he told the House, addressing the issue of the water price hike that surfaced throughout the Budget debate.

“The Government pays for part of the total cost of securing a safe and clean supply of water for our people and businesses,” he added, as he underlined the strategic value of water and updated members on plans for investments in the water system.

PUB intends to invest $4 billion on additional water infrastructure in the next five years.

The sewerage network will be improved as well.

A deep tunnel sewerage system, costing more than $4 billion, will be completed in 2025.

Another $3 billion will be spent on other sewerage network projects, and to strengthen the resilience of the water supply, in the next five years.

These expenses exceed the revenue from the water conservation tax, which is expected to be about $1.6 billion in the five-year period, he added.

Over the past three days, MPs had voiced residents’ concerns that business and living costs were expected to go up with the 30 per cent hike in water price, which will take effect in two phases, starting in July this year.

Others, however, stressed that water is a precious resource as Singapore’s existence hinges on it, and that the price of water should reflect its value.

Read Also: Water price hike necessary, but why now?

“Water sufficiency is a matter of national survival,” Mr Heng said, as he noted how founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew “obsessed over water since the Separation Agreement”.

“Securing a sustainable water supply for Singapore has been an all- consuming pursuit of the Government since Independence. We lodged our water agreements with the United Nations, invested in a strong defence force and developed strong capabilities in water technologies,” he added.

“Singaporeans have enjoyed uninterrupted and high-quality drinking water through rainy weather and droughts alike. This is not mere good fortune or our birthright. Rather, it is the result of long-term planning, a can-do attitude, innovation and sound policy,” he said.

Mr Heng reiterated a point Environment and Water Resources Minister Masagos Zulkifli made on Tuesday, that the cornerstone of Singapore’s policy on water is pricing it on sound economic principles to reflect its “long-run marginal cost” – that is, the cost of supplying the next available drop of water, which is likely to come from Newater and desalination plants.

“This ensures that users will conserve water, and we can make timely investments in the water system,” he said.

Yesterday, Ms Sylvia Lim (Aljunied GRC) of the Workers’ Party asked why a proposed carbon tax will be implemented only in 2019, but Singaporeans were not given a similar two-year notice for the increase in water price.

Read Also: Price hike reflects scarcity value of water: Masagos

Mr Heng said the carbon tax is new and it will take time to study carefully the details before rolling it out.

“A more fundamental point is whether Ms Lim agrees that water is of strategic significance and that we should each do our part,” he added.

See water price hike in perspective, says PM Lee

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong joined the discussion on the water price hike with a Facebook post yesterday, saying he hoped the debate in Parliament on the issue will remind Singaporeans of the value of water:

“The water price increase has triggered sharp reactions from Singaporeans. Two ministers – Chan Chun Sing and Masagos Zulkifli – spoke about this in Parliament yesterday(Wednesday).

They explained why water is an existential issue for Singapore, and why this price increase is unavoidable.

Singapore is an island, yet we are one of the most water-stressed countries in the world.

We have enough water today only because of our unremitting efforts since independence. For us, water will always be a strategic resource, and a matter of national security.

The Pioneer Generation knew this. So do the generations of servicemen and women who have defended Singapore.

In this situation, we have to price water properly.

Then every time we turn on the tap, we are conscious of how precious each drop is.

Read Also: Water price hike hot topic on Day 1 of Budget debate

We last revised water prices in 1997 – a long time ago. Since then, we have developed Newater.

We have also invested in desalination, which is cheaper than before but still expensive.

We need to build more Newater and desalination plants.

That is why the cost of producing water has gone up, and tariffs must rise.

We should see the 30 per cent increase in perspective.

Read Also: Budget 2017’s water price hike: What you’re not hearing about the 30% increase

Many households will get additional U-Save rebates.

So one- and two-room HDB households will not see any nett increase at all.

For most other HDB flats, the nett increase will only be between $2 and $11 per month.

For three-quarters of businesses, water bills will go up by less than a $1 per day ($25 per month). Minister Masagos shared these in his speech.

I hope this public debate reminds us how important and valuable water is, and how we can all help to conserve water, so that we always have enough water in Singapore.”

5 KEY QUESTIONS ON WATER

1. WHY MUST THE PRICE OF WATER RISE?

The price of water has to reflect what is called the long-run marginal cost (LRMC) – that is, the cost of supplying the next available drop of water.

This is likely to come from Newater and desalination plants.

As there is a limit to recycling used water in Newater plants, three desalination plants are being built within the next three years.

As more used water is reclaimed for Newater, the liquid waste is more difficult and costly to treat.

Building pipes to deliver water has also become pricier, as Singapore becomes more built up.

Pricing water right will ensure users conserve it, and enable investments in water infrastructure.

2. WHY HIKE THE PRICE NOW?

The price of water has not gone up in 17 years, since 2000. There is never a good time to raise prices, noted Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat.

But the costs of producing water are rising. PUB plans to invest $4 billion in additional water infrastructure over the next five years.

The Government is also making investments in the sewerage network.

This includes the Deep Tunnel Sewerage System, which will be ready in 2025 and will cost more than $4 billion.

Another $3 billion will also be spent on other sewerage network projects, and to strengthen the resilience of the island’s water supply.

Also, water levels in Johor’s Linggiu Reservoir, from which Singapore draws its water, have been falling in recent years, and climate change could worsen matters.

3. HOW DID 30 PER CENT FIGURE COME ABOUT?

The Government still needs to build more desalination plants and Newater plants.

So details on the costs involved in aspects of water production are commercially sensitive, and revealing specifics could prejudice future bids.

But Environment and Water Resources Minister Masagos Zulkifli told MPs that even with the 30 per cent hike, the price of water would be below cost.

4. HASN’T TECHNOLOGY HELPED?

Technologically, Singapore has squeezed everything it can from the current water processing technology.

It will take several more years to achieve the next breakthrough and bring it to a deployable scale.

5. WOULDN’T THERE BE A KNOCK-ON EFFECT ON OTHER COSTS?

The price hike translates into 75 per cent of businesses seeing an increase of less than $25 per month in water bills – or less than $1 a day.

Some businesses have said they will not increase prices.

Extra U-Save rebates for households means those in one- and two-room HDB flats will not see any increase on average.

For other HDB flat types, monthly water bills will go up by between $2 and $11 per month.

Overall, spending on water will remain at about 1 per cent of household income for most families.

ziliang@sph.com.sg

This article was first published on March 3, 2017.
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