SINGAPORE - Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam on Monday said allegations that his son was involved in contracts to renovate state-owned black and white bungalows at No. 26 and No. 31 Ridout Road are “utterly false and defamatory”.
Refuting claims that home interior and renovation company Livspace – where his son Ravindran has worked since 2019 – had been awarded contracts by the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), Mr Shanmugam said these were “attacks” on himself and his family.
“Do these people really believe that CPIB (Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau) would not have found this out, if it were true?” he told the House after Ms Nadia Samdin (Ang Mo Kio GRC) asked about the claims.
“I say to these people, you want to come after me, you come after me. I’m perfectly capable of defending myself... But leave my family alone,” Mr Shanmugam added, during a debate over the rental of black-and-white bungalows by himself, Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan and their spouses.
Second Minister for Law Edwin Tong said checks done after the allegations had started to surface online over the weekend found that Livspace was not an appointed contractor for the two Ridout Road properties. The firm does not have any transactions with SLA.
Said Mr Tong: “The suggestion that Minister Shanmugam’s son, or his company Livspace, was appointed – and I think the sting of these allegations is that there’s a preference given to this – is completely scurrilous and unwarranted.”
In a statement responding to what it said were “various untrue and malicious allegations that have been made”, Livspace said it has not undertaken any project or work at any of the properties in Ridout Road – neither for SLA, home owners nor tenants.
“Livspace has no contracts with SLA and Livspace has never been engaged by SLA to do any work,” said the company, which was founded in 2014 in Bengaluru, India.
Opposition politician Kenneth Jeyaretnam had suggested that Mr Shanmugam’s son was involved in the Ridout Road affair in a blog post published on Sunday, though he said he had not independently verified this information.
Similar accusations were also made by opposition figure and fugitive lawyer Charles Yeo on Instagram.
A post that Mr Yeo made about this has since been restricted for Singapore users, following what the social media platform said in a notice was a “legal request” to do so.
According to Mr Ravindran Shanmugam’s LinkedIn profile, he had joined Livspace as its Singapore country head in March 2019, before becoming chief executive for South-east Asia in June 2021.
Ms Nadia on Monday also asked Mr Tong how SLA scopes and awards contracts for restoration and maintenance works for black-and-white bungalows here.
In response, Mr Tong said contracts for works on SLA-owned properties are awarded through open tenders.
An external consultant is engaged to study the state of the property and make recommendations to SLA about the works that need to be done and how to do so, given the conservation guidelines.
After the recommendations are accepted, the relevant works are then carried out by a separate contractor, Mr Tong added.
“In this case, what happened was we put up an open tender, and a term contractor was then appointed to carry out the works,” he said, adding that a conservation specialist was also appointed.
