On Wednesday ( October 16 ), deputy chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore ( MAS ) accused opposition lawmakers Associate Professor Jamus Lim and Mr. Leong Mun Wai of wanting to” throw our public officers under the bus” in their criticism of the handling of the Income-Allianz deal.
Mr. Chee then directed the Workers ‘ Party’s Assoc Prof Prof Lim and Mr. Leong of Progress Singapore Party to retract their notes during a political debate on a proposed legislative act that targeted the proposed offer. Mr. Chee is also the transport minister and subsequent minister for financing.
After MAS provided details about a S$ 1.85 billion investment recovery envisioned by parties involved in the deal, the government intervened on Monday to stop European insurer Allianz from acquiring Income Insurance.
When Income was corporatized in 2022, Section 88 of the Co-operative Societies Act was removed, allowing it to transfer approximately S$ 2 billion in surplus to the new business institution.
The proposed money reduction so “runs store” to the , concept for why this exemption was given, Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Edwin Tong originally said.
Assoc Prof Lim stated in a statement to legislature on Wednesday that the incident was a” communication breakdown” and that it may point to some disturbing pathologies with how the government communicates information between itself and the general public.
He questioned whether MAS regulators had the opportunity to conduct a “holistic analysis” of the consolidation during the “brief interval” they had starting in mid-July, and why they had not established a connection between the proposed offer and the Section 88 exemption before.
” I wonder if it’s only me that I find it troubling that there was n’t a coordinated discussion between the two main, important regulators, MAS and MCCY, prior to the proposed deal,” he said.
Assoc Prof. Lim furthermore questioned whether the civil service was” sufficiently siloed,” that no joint working class was convened to maintain adequate information exchange in advance, even for purchases of such fame.
The government has been left with the impression that our government authorities are fragmented, and the government’s coordination is bad, according to Mr. Leong.
” Or to put it simply, the left hand does certainly know what the right side is doing.”
He claimed that the suggested deal’s” money reduction exercise” ought to have sounded alarm bells in MAS.
While we trust that MAS officials are highly qualified and have examined the transaction thoroughly from a regulatory perspective, the minister could further explain why MAS does not have any additional regulatory concerns, especially given NTUC Enterprise’s history of having to add money to money over the years.
He also described the Income-Allianz offer as” an asset-stripping training in favour of the owners, mainly NTUC Enterprise and Allianz”.
NTUC Enterprise is Income’s big investor.
Mr. Chee claimed in his final statement that Assoc Prof. Lim and Mr. Leong had made “grave claims” about government officials and organizations before the amendment was passed.
Why do Mr. Leong and Associate Professor Lim need to continue to advocate for kicking our government employees under the van? “he asked.
He claimed that MAS officers had no idea what the terms and obligations were in relation to Income’s Section 88 exemption, and that they just realized there might be a connection after a political debate on the proposed deal on August 6th.
He said he hoped the two opposition politicians may provide MAS soldiers” some payment”.
” They were certainly trying to do something bad, or as Professor Lim mentioned, to lead to various breakdowns of communications or to operate in a fragmented way,” said the minister.
” There’s definitely hardly what they were trying to accomplish. They made every effort to deliver their job. And when they saw that there was a connection, they shared the information.”
During corrections, Assoc Prof Lim said he had” strong value” for legal employees.
” But I feel that it’s still important for me to show situations where the structure that the civil company operates under is problematic, which is, to be clear, controlled by this state.
” Because our civil servants can only do what they can within the limitations of the current state,” he said.
Mr. Chee therefore requested that he retract his “unfounded complaints” that the state of the day imposed restrictions on the sharing of information.
Mr Chee likewise took problem with Mr Leong’s description of the proposed bargain as “asset-stripping”, saying this was not a good description.
” I believe Mr. Leong purposefully chose that name. And he continued,” This is not the first time I’ve heard Mr. Leong disparage NTUC.”
He added that Income entered the deal with” the right intent” and “acted on good faith” to strengthen Income’s financial position.
During corrections, Mr Leong doubled down on the word “asset-stripping”, saying:” Anyone with some knowledge about financing would agree with me. It’s a fact. It is unrelated to the intended intent.
” You can intend, your intentions can be good. But the plan that you put up is actually not so good, you can even say detrimental.”
He also described the earlier Aug 6 parliamentary debate on the Income-Allianz deal as” quite a waste of time” as they were discussing the matter” without complete information”.
Later, Mr Chee also asked Mr Leong to withdraw this” waste of time” comment, saying he was” dismayed” by it.
The minister said,” I think the Aug 6 debate gave members the chance to ask questions, for MCCY and MAS to clarify what was going on at the time, and then to hear the members ‘ concerns,” according to the minister.
He added that there was no regulatory approval or decision by the government on the proposed deal at the time of the Aug 6 session, and that it was only appropriate for political officeholders to respond to inquiries based on the information they had at the time.
Countering the” asset-stripping “description again, Mr Chee also said that capital reduction was not uncommon, and that financial optimisation was something companies did regularly.