SINGAPORE – Sixteen people were charged in court on Jan 29 with corruption and cheating offences. They include employees from the British Council, Sephora Asia, Fei Siong Food Management, SMRT’s business arm Stellar Lifestyle, and ComfortDelGro’s advertising arm Moove Media.
Low Lee Soon, a 61-year-old arts director of Moove Media, is accused of accepting bribes worth $160,000 in the form of cash loans from Xu Zhiping, 38, a shareholder of advertising firms Channelbytes, Channelink and Multiverse Media.
Xu had allegedly conspired with Jane Hong Hoe Chun, 53, who is the director of the three advertising companies, to advance their business interests with Moove Media and ComfortDelGro. Their charge sheets do not state the contracts the companies were involved in.
While investigating Low, Xu and Hong, the Corruption Practices Investigation Bureau said in a statement on Jan 29 that it discovered offences involving another 13 individuals who were charged on Jan 29.
They include Muhammadd Fauzi Abdul Rahman, 41, who is said to have accepted bribes worth around $506,107 from Xu, Hong, Lee Lian Hiang – a 55-year-old director of BuildCool Engineering – and Tan Han Leong – a 44-year-old director of Secured Retail Solutions – between March 2019 and January 2022.
Muhammadd Fauzi was a store planning manager of Pan Pacific Retail Management Singapore at the time.
In November 2021, he also allegedly cheated Hong of $500 by deceiving her that Channelbytes needed to hire a security guard to replace a television at Don Don Donki’s Tampines store, which was under his company’s management, when there was no such need.
Tan Ming Yean, 42, an employee of Stellar Lifestyle, is accused of accepting bribes worth $7,212 from Xu to advance the business interests of Channelbytes and Channelink with Stellar Lifestyle.
Low Kim Yong, a 44-year-old assistant project manager at Sephora Asia, is said to have accepted cash bribes worth $32,518 and a used Microsoft laptop from four individuals to advance their business interests with Sephora. The four are Xu, Lee, Tan Han Leong and Tan Chee Heng, 64, who is director of Design Delta.
Lee Kok Keong, 50, who was then a director of resources at the British Council – Britain’s international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities – allegedly received cash bribes worth $100,300 from Lee Lian Hiang and Ong Seck Cheng, director of Encompass Construction. He took the bribes between September 2014 and February 2020.
Tan Han Leong allegedly conspired with Moh Jun Hao – a 45-year-old sales consultant at Secured Retail Solutions – to give cash bribes worth around $5,000 to Benjamin Ting Ping Lin – a 34-year-old IT executive at Fei Siong Food Management – and two other employees from co-working space provider Found8 and Fish & Co Restaurants.
Ting is also accused of giving $500 to an individual as an inducement to prevent the individual from exposing the corrupt dealings between Fei Siong and Secured Retail Solutions.
Lee Lian Hiang allegedly gave bribes worth $12,800 to Au Yong Siong Fatt, 49, and Juraimee Ab Hamid, 48, to advance the business interests of BuildCool Engineering with the Civil Service Club and HomeTeamNS, respectively, between 2018 and 2021.
Au Yong was an external consultant at the Civil Service Club and Juraimee was a senior operations executive at HomeTeamNS (Bukit Batok) at the time.
In September 2020, Lee Lian Hiang also allegedly conspired with Tan Wee Meng, a project supervisor at BuildCool, to give Juraimee falsified quotations to mislead HomeTeamNS into believing that Triple L Aircon and Triple L Aircon & Engineering had bids for projects when they did not.
All 16 individuals were charged under the Prevention of Corruption Act, which carries a maximum punishment of a $100,000 fine and a five-year jail term for each offence. Those convicted of cheating can be fined and sentenced to up to three years’ jail.
Editor’s note: This story has been edited for clarity.
