MARUAH Singapore

“What do you do, Mr President?” – Forum on the Presidential Elections (Note: change of venue)

2 August 2011

Join our discussants, Dr Kevin Tan and Mr Alex Au, as we review the presidential elections this August.

Date: 20th August 2011, Saturday

Time: 3.30pm to 5.00pm

Venue: 9 Penang Road, #13-15 Park Mall (map)

MARUAH (Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, Singapore) has put together this public forum to continue our key role in increasing public awareness of Singapore’s election processes and our country’s constitutional matters.

We strongly believe that information is crucial to acting and voting responsibly. The Presidential Elections and the mandate it confers on the Elected President has to be clearly discussed so that the Singaporeans can make informed choices.

Our speakers, a constitutional expert and an activist blogger, have been asked to share with us their insight and knowledge on the mandate of the Elected President and how we can make decisions that is the best for Singapore.

This Forum has also been timed to take place in advance of the Presidential polling date (which at this point is yet to be announced) and we hope that through this Forum, Singaporeans will be made aware of their rights as citizens and their responsibilities as voters.

To register, please visit this link.

About the speakers

Alex Au Waipang is a well-known web commentator, writing on Yawning Bread. His cutting and insightful analysis on society and politics has not only earned him a loyal following, but the attention of opinion of policy makers from time to time. In activism, he is primarily known for his work in equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered persons but has also spoken out for civil liberties, abolition of the death penalty, fair treatment for migrant workers, and human rights in general. Au has contributed chapters to several books that look at politics and governance in Singapore, most recently a chapter on political parties’ performance in the general election of 2011 in Voting in Change (Ethos Books).

Kevin YL Tan has been teaching constitutional law for the past 25 years. A graduate of the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore and of Yale Law School, he has written and edited over 25 books on law, history and politics. He is currently Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore and Adjunct Professor at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University.

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The case of Ismil Kadar and the death penalty – MARUAH’s letter to the ST Forum

12 July 2011

Please see below for MARUAH’s letter to the ST Forum on the case of Mr Ismil Kadar and the death penalty.

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http://www.straitstimes.com/STForum/Story/STIStory_689614.html
A case for discussion on death penalty

I REFER to last Wednesday’s article (‘Man accused of murder freed after 6 years in jail’).

This case supports MARUAH’s position that various aspects of the death penalty in Singapore contravene international human rights norms.

The principle of proportionality requires that the death penalty applies only to the most serious cases.

Singapore also allows someone to be convicted based solely on his confession to the police. It is difficult, if not impossible, for an accused person to prove that his confession was involuntary.

MARUAH calls for the death penalty to be unavailable in cases where the conviction was based only on a confession, as well as especially rigorous supervision of police interrogations in potential capital cases, such as having video-recording of interrogations.

More importantly, Ismil Kadar reportedly has an IQ of 73. MARUAH is troubled by the apparent lack of safeguards when interrogating persons with mental disabilities, and asks the police to clarify the protections that are in place.

More fundamentally, MARUAH believes that it would never be just to hang a person with mental disabilities based solely on his confession.
The recent introduction of criminal discovery, 13 years after the Law Society first called for it in 1998, has addressed the historical disadvantages to the defence in the criminal justice system. But we have to wonder if there had been potential miscarriages of justice before this.

The irreversibility of the death penalty demands the most rigorous of processes before someone is convicted and hanged.

MARUAH believes that Singapore needs to have an open and informed debate on whether the death penalty has a place here, and if so, in what shape and form.

MARUAH also calls for a moratorium on executions in the interim. Cases like Ismil’s demand that we do this, to ensure that Singapore never comes close to hanging an innocent person.

Peter Low
Death Penalty Committee
MARUAH (Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, Singapore)

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UN Human Rights Council passes resolution on Human Rights, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

20 June 2011

In a resolution (A/HRC/17/L.9/Rev.1) regarding human rights, sexual orientation and gender identity, adopted by a vote of 23 in favour, 19 against, and 3 abstentions, the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) requested the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to commission a study to be finalised by December 2011 to document discriminatory laws and practices and acts of violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation and gender identity, in all regions of the world, and how international human rights law can be used to end violence and related human rights violations based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

The HRC also decided to convene a panel discussion during the nineteenth session of the Human Rights Council, informed by the facts contained in the study commissioned by OHCHR and to have constructive, informed and transparent dialogue on the issue of discriminatory laws and practices and acts of violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation and gender identity.

The HRC will also discuss the appropriate follow-up to the recommendations of the study commissioned by OHCHR.

More details can be found in the link below
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=38762

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Event report – “Post-Elections: Perspectives and An Analysis” forum on 15 May 2011

31 May 2011

One week after the General Elections of 2011, Singapore human rights NGO MARUAH (Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, Singapore) and socio-political community blog The Online Citizen (TOC) jointly presented a post-elections forum at the Post-Museum on 15 May 2011.

The sudden announcement a day earlier that Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew and Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong were resigning from the Cabinet only added to the expectant atmosphere at the event.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Report Card on Singapore’s human rights – Universal Periodic Review – 25 May, 7pm

19 May 2011

MARUAH (Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, Singapore) is organising a post-Universal Periodic Review (UPR) discussion to share with you some of the key discussions that took place recently in Geneva when Singapore’s human rights record was reviewed at the United Nations (UN).

It is a good opportunity for many to get on track with human rights discussions; for others to follow-up on the latest in Geneva; and for all of us to look at ways of going forward on some key areas.

Date:	25^th May 2011 (Wednesday)
Time:	7 – 9 pm
Place:	Training room 5 & 6 (3^rd floor) Singapore Council of Women’s Organisations (SCWO) 96 Waterloo Street Singapore 187967 (Map)

Please email maruahsg@gmail.com to register your attendance.

UPR references below
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/BasicFacts.aspx
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/PAGES/SGSession11.aspx

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MARUAH interview with Li Fan, election monitor from China

12 May 2011

MARUAH: Good afternoon Mr Li. Welcome to Singapore. Thank you for agreeing to this interview at such short notice. Can you tell us a little about yourself?

LI FAN: My background is in Political Science – I have two Masters degrees, one from Beijing Normal University and one from Ohio State University. I returned to China in 1989 and things were quite bad at that time so I worked for the government initially. In 1993, I moved from the government to establish a NGO – a think tank – the World and China Institute (www.world-china.org). We aimed to help local governments with elections. We helped organise the first local township election in 1998 in Sichuan in Buyun township. Since then, I have been very interested in election work. After this, we helped local people and local governments across China conduct village elections. Our first election observation project was in China was in 2002 after observing the Cambodian election. We observed a village election in Hubei. We had a three person team with a lawyer, a reporter and myself (an academic). When we arrived in town, we informed the local government that we had “come to observe the elections, whether we were welcome or not”. We did not call ahead. If we did, we knew would not be welcomed. Since we were there, they had no choice and could not stop us from monitoring the local election.

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MARUAH & TOC – Post-Elections public forum – 15 May 2011, 4pm

12 May 2011

The recent Singapore General Elections 2011 was electrifying. Emotions ran high and change was in the air.

The dissection has begun.

MARUAH & TOC would like to share perspectives and some analysis on GE2011. We will share the work that we did on the monitoring of mainstream media and the results of the survey on voters about their polling experience. NTU’s Cherian George will give us an overview of GE2011 and Yawning Bread’s Alex Au will tell us what he saw on the ground.

Please do come. Stay engaged. We are part of this flow and we hope you will also share your thoughts.

To RSVP, please email maruahsg@gmail.com with your name and organisation.

Date/Time:
15 May 2011 (Sunday)
4 – 7pm

Venue:
Post-Museum
107 Rowell Road
Singapore 208031
Map

Programme:
GE2011 – An Overview
Associate Professor Cherian George
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
Nanyang Technological University

Election monitoring process
Associate Professor Paul Ananth Tambyah
Ms Braema Mathi
MARUAH (Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, Singapore)

People’s Perspectives
Mr Alex Au
Yawning Bread

Moderator
Mr Choo Zheng Xi
Former Editor
The Online Citizen

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MARUAH’s Initial Response to Singapore’s 1st Universal Periodic Review

9 May 2011

MEDIA RELEASE

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MARUAH’s Initial Response to Singapore’s 1^st Universal Periodic Review

Geneva, 6 May 2011 – MARUAH applauds the government’s decision to ratify by 2012 the Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities. MARUAH hopes this can be done without any reservations.

Ambassador Ong Keng Yong, Singapore’s Ambassador-at-Large, as head of the Singapore delegation, made this announcement at Singapore’s first Universal Periodic Review (UPR) report at the Human Rights Council that was held today, 6 May 2011.

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MARUAH media monitoring: 7 May 2011

9 May 2011

MARUAH is conducting an election watch project. Part of this project includes monitoring the election coverage by the mainstream media, specifically the Straits Times, TODAY and The New Paper. (We are unable to cover the other languages and other media, e.g. TV and radio, because of resource constraints.)

Our findings are set out below.

You can also download the findings as a PDF file.

Coverage of each party (in column inches)