Posted on June 11, 2009 by
thesunshineson
Coming close at the heels of the Aware
saga and the concern over Christian fundamentalism taking root in Singapore,
the 8 weeks jail is a warning that the government will get tough and
tougher. Ong Kian Cheong and Dorothy
Chan were just at the wrong place at the wrong time. If the Aware saga did not
explode as it did, the couple would probably have gotten a lighter sentence and
a slap on the wrist. But jail sentences won’t stop fundamentalists, it might be
their badge of faith instead. Maybe they should be rehabilitated like the
Jemaah Islamiyah terrorists held under the ISA.
Couple sentenced to 8 weeks jail for
distributing seditious publications
SINGAPORE : A couple, found guilty last
month of distributing seditious or objectionable publications, has been
sentenced to 8 weeks jail each.
50-year-old SingTel technical officer
Ong Kian Cheong and his 46-year-old wife, UBS associate director Dorothy Chan
Hien Leng, had been found guilty on four charges each of sedition.
For two decades, the couple spread their
faith by handing out religious pamphlets, and then by dropping tracts into
random HDB letterboxes.
From around 1998, however, the couple,
both Protestant Christians, mailed them to addresses picked out from the
telephone directory – those of Muslims included.
They “clearly did so with the intent of
convincing the Muslim reader to convert to Christianity”, a district court
found.
For distributing and possessing
seditious and objectionable publications, husband and wife were sentenced to
eight weeks’ jail each on Wednesday.
Such “intolerance, insensitivity and
ignorance of delicate issues concerning race and religion” in Singapore
“clearly warranted” a custodial sentence, said District Judge Roy Neighbour.
In the first full trial heard under the
Sedition Act, the married couple of 24 years was found guilty on May 28 of the
charges.
In 2007, Mr Irwan Ariffin, 32, and Madam
Farhati Ahmad, 36, received an evangelistic comic-style booklet titled The
Little Bride through the mail while Mr Isa Raffee, 35, was sent Who Is Allah?.
After a complaint to the police, an
ambush was laid and the pair was arrested on Jan 30 last year.
Found in their condominium in Bukit
Timah were 439 copies of 11 seditious tracts.
During the 11-day trial, it emerged that
the SingTel technical officer and his wife, sent out about 20,000 publications
in seven years.
Produced by an American firm called
Chick Publications, the fundamentalist Protestant materials were “not only
offensive for religious content but also have a tendency to promote feelings of
ill-will or hostility between Muslims and Christians in Singapore”, said Judge
Neighbour.
By distributing tracts with “callous,
denigratory, offensive and insensitive statements on religion with aspersions
on race”, the pair had committed “serious” offences that “have the capacity to
undermine and erode the delicate fabric of racial and religious harmony in
Singapore”.
Common sense, he said, dictated that
religious fervor to spread the faith, “in our society, must be constrained by
sensitivity, tolerance and mutual respect for another’s faith and religious
beliefs”.
Ong and Chan were expressionless when
sentenced.
Their lawyer Selva K Naidu told the
court that they had filed a notice of appeal against the conviction last Friday.
He was awaiting instructions to proceed.
The pair faced two charges of
distributing seditious publications each, and one each of distributing an
objectionable publication and possession of seditious tracts.
They got four weeks’ jail for each
charge – two of them running consecutively and the remaining to run
concurrently.
They could have been fined up to $5,000
and/or jailed for up to three years for each of the two charges.
The possession charge carries a maximum
fine of $2,000 and/or jail for up to 18 months. Distributing objectionable
publications is punishable with a fine not exceeding $5,000 and/or up to one
year behind bars. – CNA /ls
