Shanmugam rejects Jolovan Wham’s bid to vary or cancel Pofma directive for tweet about minister’s remarks on rule of law

SINGAPORE — Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam has rejected an application by activist and social worker Jolovan Wham to vary or cancel the correction direction issued to him under the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (Pofma).

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said in a statement on Thursday (Oct 14) that a correction direction under Pofma was issued on Oct 8 to Mr Wham, over a tweet he posted on Oct 6 about Mr Shanmugam's remarks on the rule of law.

The tweet “communicates the falsehood that the Minister for Home Affairs adopts the view that the rule of law does not operate anywhere in the real world, including in Singapore", MHA said.

A correction direction is issued when a falsehood is communicated that affects the public interest.

Mr Wham’s tweet had referred to an article from the Mothership website, which took what the minister said in Parliament earlier this month out of context. The article has since been corrected.

Mr Wham was required to publish a correction notice on his social media acount. On Oct 10, Mr Wham tweeted a correction notice with a link to the correct statement.

He also replied to his own tweet on Oct 10 that he did not agree with the correction and will be making an application to cancel or vary the notice.

MHA said that having carefully considered the application, Mr Shanmugam had decided to reject it.

“The conditions for issuing the correction direction are satisfied, and the application did not disclose any grounds to the contrary,” the ministry said.

“Mr Jolovan Wham has been notified of the rejection.”

On Oct 7, MHA issued letters to nine persons, including Mr Wham, who had published "false posts" on their Facebook or Twitter accounts that "misrepresented" what Mr Shanmugam said in Parliament. They were told to apologise and correct their false statements.

Except for Mr Wham, the others have apologised for what they did, corrected their posts or done both, MHA said the next day.