Dr Chee Soon Juan demanded an apology from Mr Lee Kuan Yew, Mr Goh Chok Tong and their lawyer and PAP MP, Mr Davinder Singh, over remarks Mr Singh made in his submissions during a hearing on 6 September 2004.
Dr Chee was in court today to ask for the hearing on 6 September, conducted in his absence, to be reconvened.
While presenting his case, Dr Chee quoted Mr Singh’s statement: “Dr Chee is really not asking for an adjournment…This is not the conduct of a man who genuinely wants to appear for the hearing. He has no intention of coming, now or later.”
The SDP secretary-general replied to Mr Singh’s comments and said that he was back in Singapore: “I have returned and as sure as I am standing here, I want an apology from the plaintiffs and Mr Singh. If he is man enough, Mr Singh will admit that he was wrong and apologise.”
Mr Singh refused.
Dr Chee then proceeded to lay out his case that the plaintiffs had tried to bring forward the hearing from September to August 2004, knowing full well that he would not be back in Singapore at that time. He said that this was more evidence that both Mr Lee and Mr Goh was trying to avoid him in court.
He also brought up the fact that while the courts had agreed to consider the plaintiffs’ request to bring forward the hearing dates, it had refused to do the same for Dr Chee.
The plaintiffs lawyer than asked that Dr Chee to file an affidavit to support his application to reconvene the hearing. The judge agreed and asked Dr Chee if he was prepared to file an affidavit.
Dr Chee said that he was not familiar with the rules and asked the judge if this was required whenever the a party made a request for hearing dates to be postponed. The judge said yes.
Dr Chee was not convinced and wanted to seek legal advice on the matter. The judge gave Dr Chee until next Monday to decide.