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AHPETC yet to explain serious financial mismanagement: Desmond Lee

SINGAPORE — Minister of State (National Development) Desmond Lee today (Nov 21) issued a statement (carried in full below) on the high service and conservancy charge (S&CC) arrears rates at Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC). Among the issues raised, Mr Lee questioned the delay in explaining the arrears rates and noted that while AHPETC chairman Sylvia Lim cited the Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) audit as a reason for the town council not being able to submit its arrears reports on time, the town council had stopped providing the data 10 months before the AGO audit started.

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SINGAPORE — Minister of State (National Development) Desmond Lee today (Nov 21) issued a statement (carried in full below) on the high service and conservancy charge (S&CC) arrears rates at Aljunied-Hougang-Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC). Among the issues raised, Mr Lee questioned the delay in explaining the arrears rates and noted that while AHPETC chairman Sylvia Lim cited the Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) audit as a reason for the town council not being able to submit its arrears reports on time, the town council had stopped providing the data 10 months before the AGO audit started.

In reply to media queries, AHPETC vice-chairmen Pritam Singh and Png Eng Huat said the town council has not “obfuscated or intentionally delayed” its response to matters raised by Mr Lee, and has “made it known to the public that we are looking into the S&CC arrears data, and will respond to the query on the financial and arrears situation in due course”. The full response by Mr Singh and Mr Png is carried below.

Here is the statement by Minister of State (National Development) Desmond Lee in full:

“AHPETC has yet to explain its serious financial mismanagement, and the S&CC arrears. Instead, we have seen a coordinated online campaign to distract the public, using falsehoods, half-truths and speculations, by friends, sympathisers and proxies of the Workers’ Party (WP). The aim is to confuse the public and distract them from the real issues. MND has addressed these untruths. This is what the WP often does when caught under the spotlight – raise a flurry of red herrings in the hope that people forget that they have not come clean.

The key issue is accountability and transparency.

By its own admission, the AHPETC has seen 29.4 per cent of its residents owing S&CC for three months or more. That was in Apr 2013, a sudden spike beyond the already high arrears rates consistently reported in the TC’s previous submissions.

How did this happen? And what is the current arrears rate?

Only the TC knows the answer, but it refuses to answer. Why? Ms Sylvia Lim and Mr Pritam Singh have said they will give answers in “due course”. Why the delay and obfuscation?

Since May 2013, AHPETC has stopped submitting its S&CC arrears data to MND. It now also refuses to tell the public the truth. Ms Sylvia Lim has given the excuse that this is because they are busy with the AGO Audit. How can this be the reason, when the TC stopped providing the data 10 months before the AGO Audit even started? And surely the TC must know the arrears position, whether or not an Audit is in progress?

There are other concerns. AHPETC received the same S&CC grants in FY12 that it got before the 2011 General Election. Yet, in FY10 the TC ran an operating surplus of S$3.3m, but in FY12 it ran a deficit of S$734,000. Why did this happen? Is the S&CC from Aljunied GRC residents being used to cover the deficit in Hougang TC? (In FY10, Hougang TC had an operating deficit of S$92,000.) If so, surely residents of Aljunied GRC are entitled to know?

Just as the TC had not answered questions raised by their own Auditors, Foo Kon Tan Grant Thornton, it has also not answered questions from the public about the state of its finances today.”

Statement by AHPETC vice-chairmen Pritam Singh and Png Eng Huat in full:

We refer to the remarks made by the Minister of State for the Ministry of National Development (MND), Mr Desmond Lee on 21 November 2014.

AHPETC have not obfuscated or intentionally delayed in responding to the matters raised by MOS Lee, but have made it known to the public that we are looking into the S&CC arrears data, and will respond to the query on the financial and arrears situation in due course.

We are surprised that MOS Lee has framed the matter as an issue of transparency and accountability. The Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) has been auditing AHPETC’s accounts, and we believe that MND will make the AGO report public in its entirety when the audit ends.

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