After claiming that the Prime Minister and Law Minister have the power to affect the limits of performance bonuses given to specific High Court judges, Reform Party leader Kenneth Jeyaretnam received a correction order under the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act ( POFMA ) on Wednesday ( May 29 ).
Next Minister for Law Edwin Tong, who is also Minister for Culture, Community and Youth, instructed the POFMA Office to challenge the attempt to Mr Jeyaretnam, the Ministry of Law said in a press release.
The previous six POFMA orders were related to Mr. Jeyaretnam’s feedback about the leasing of black-and-white houses at Ridout Road by two ministers, and this is the sixth one that has been received.
The most recent attempt is connected to the defamation allegations made by the two ministers, Vivian Balakrishnan and K Shanmugam, both of whom are ministers, against Mr. Lee Hsien Yang over his remarks regarding the state’s hire of the properties.
Last week a High Court judge ordered , Mr Lee, the brother of former Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, to pay , S$ 200, 000 ( US$ 148, 000 ) in damages to Mr Shanmugam and Dr Balakrishnan for defaming them.
Mr. Jeyaretnam questioned the court’s decision to award damages to the officials in a Facebook post on May 25 and claimed that Mr. Shanmugam as Law Minister “may have some influence, along with the Prime Minister, on the interview and development of High Court judges and the size of their achievement prizes.”
An essay on the president’s fact- reviewing website Factually said that this is misleading.
” Under Article 98 ( 6 ) of the Constitution, the legislature shall by law provide for the remuneration of the Supreme Court judges”, the article said.
The” Judges ‘ Remuneration Act 1994″ establishes the standards for the classes of pay, benefits, and benefits that Supreme Court judges receive. Supreme Court judges as a group are subject to a fixed monthly pensionable income by law.
The Supreme Court is a division of the Supreme Court.
According to the content,” The Chief Justice then determines the salaries and bonuses that each Supreme Court judge is entitled to receive within the meaning of the law,” the post continued.
The Minister or any other minister is unable to decide or impact the amounts to be paid to certain judges under this framework.
The post also highlighted that the Constitution prohibits the changes of a Supreme Court court’s terms of office, including compensation,  , to their risk after their visit.
” Mr Jeyaretnam’s incident is so false”, the post said.
According to the POFMA attempt, Mr. Jeyaretnam has updated his Instagram post by adding a correction see, stating that it contains a fake statement of fact and directing visitors to the president’s clarifications on Factually.