No Evidence

In a verdict that surprised no one, former Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) director Ng Boon Gay was acquitted of all four corruption charges against him. The case has gripped Singapore since late last year when it started but from the very start the prosecution had problems proving that corruption was involved.

Mr. Ng has been having an affair with former IT sales executive Cecilia Sue. Her then employers Oracle Corporation Singapore and Hitachi Data Systems managed to get two separate IT contracts worth S$320,000 from the CNB. The prosecution’s case is that Mr. Ng influenced the tender of the contracts in return for sex.

The problem is that they can’t prove it!

I admit; when I first read about the case, it looked very bad for Mr. Ng. However from the very get-go, I had problems understanding the prosecution’s case. In their opening statement, the prosecution admitted that Mr. Ng had at no time influenced or was directly involved in the process of awarding the two contracts. Yet somehow they still charge Mr. Ng for corruption!

The problem for the prosecution is that they had no proof! Like I said earlier, it looks bad, but even so you still need to prove that there was corruption. The prosecution was unable to do that and frankly, this case should never have made its way to the court. The evidence just wasn’t there.