SINGAPORE — The press secretary to Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam has called out a Facebook post by NUSSU — NUS Students United (NSU) for misleadingly quoting Mr Shanmugam in order to give a false impression of what he had actually said.

The NSU post features a chart which describes a Rachel Ong Sin Yen as a new face in the People’s Action Party as well as the chief executive officer of Rohei Learning and Consulting.

On the chart is a quote by Mr Shanmugam which reads: “If we do not separate religion from politics, then whose religion comes into politics?”

Below the chart is a statement which reads: “If Ms Ong wishes to run for elections, she must resign all executive positions with Rohei, an organisation with religious leanings.”

Ms Ong was one of four young party activists who were introduced at the PAP65 Awards and Convention at the Singapore Expo on Nov 10, which was held to mark the 65th anniversary of the PAP’s founding.

In a media statement on Friday (Nov 22) evening, Mr Goh Chour Thong, the press secretary, said that NSU had misused Mr Shanmugam’s quote which he had said in Parliament on Oct 7 to make a false statement.

In his rebuttal, Mr Goh said that the NSU’s assertions directly contradicted with what Mr Shanmugam had said in Parliament, also on Oct 7, that Members of Parliament (MPs), even Ministers, can hold positions in religious organisations.

In his speech in Parliament, Mr Shanmugam said: “We have got to look at these things with care and without a party lens, to decide on what is good for Singapore. We must handle these issues with sensibility, care and wisdom.”

Mr Shanmugam did not say that a political candidate running for elections, or an MP, must resign from all executive positions in organisations with religious leanings, Mr Goh asserted.

“In fact he said the very opposite, that they can continue to hold such posts, and as he said, these things must be dealt with wisdom and common sense,” said Mr Goh.

He added that the quote on separation of religion and politics that was set out in the NSU post relates to a very different point that Mr Shanmugam had made.

“(Mr Shanmugam) had said that religious beliefs should not and cannot be said to be the bases for public policy making. That is quite different from saying that MPs should resign from all positions, in organisations with religious leanings,” said Mr Goh. “As the minister said in Parliament, all persons, including religious leaders, have civil and political rights.”.

The press secretary also said that the NSU Facebook post had taken a quote from the late founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew — which he had said during the National Day Rally in 1987 — out of context to further mislead its readers.

The quote in question: “Churchmen, lay preachers, priests, monks, Muslim theologians, all those who claim divine sanctions of holy insights, take off your clerical robes before you take on anything economic or political. Take it off.”

Mr Goh said that the NSU’s Facebook post had misused Mr Lee’s quote to falsely assert that he had meant that religious leaders had no political rights.

“Mr Lee was actually saying that religious leaders who wanted to make political statements should not do so in their capacity as religious leaders. Instead, they should enter the political arena as politicians, and give their views,” said Mr Goh.

In his statement, Mr Goh said that Singapore is a secular state that does not have an established or official religion.

“But this doesn’t mean we are anti-religion or that we disallow people of faith from participating in politics. A secular state does not mean we have to be anti-religion. And we are not anti-religion,” he said.

Noting that the NSU Facebook page is neither the official page of the National University of Singapore’s (NUS) Student Union, nor its affiliate’s page, Mr Goh said that the name appears to have been “disingenuously chosen” to lead readers to assume that the views espoused on the page are being expressed by NUS or its students.

“The name as well as its deliberately misleading posts show that the site is run by people with no integrity, bent on sowing discord and hatred,” said Mr Goh.

In a reminder, Mr Goh said that the public should be more discerning of those who launch such attacks “from behind the anonymity of the Internet”.

He added that those who launch such attacks should be more ethical and not peddle falsehoods, be more transparent in their dealings to not mislead people, and to be transparent about their political leanings so that “readers can judge for themselves what weight to place on (such) views”.