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Tan Cheng Bock v AG [2017] SGCA 50 (1) The statutory context 76 First, under Art 2 of the Constitution, unless the context otherwise requires, “President” is defined to mean: the President of Singapore elected under this Constitution and includes any person for the time being exercising the functions of the office of President [emphasis added] It is obvious, by reason of Art 19B(3) and what we have said at [61] above, that the latter part of that definition cannot possibly apply in the context of this discussion. The material part of the definition is therefore the “President … elected under this Constitution”. Clearly, the manner of electing the President under the Constitution has been amended from time to time, notably in 1991 and 2016, but this definition predates both those sets of amendments and has not been amended since the Constitution (1980 Reprint). 77 Art 2 also defines “commencement” to mean: “commencement”, used with reference to this Constitution, means 9th August 1965 [emphasis added] 78 This is potentially significant because it suggests that “this Constitution” commenced upon Independence, even though it has undoubtedly been amended from time to time. 79 As for the election of the President under the Constitution, Art 17A(1) provides: 17A.—(1) The President is to be elected by the citizens of Singapore in accordance with any law made by the Legislature. [emphasis added] 80 This compares with Art 17(1) of the Constitution (1980 Reprint) which was in force prior to the 1991 Amendment and which provided that: 42

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Tan Chen Bock v. Attorney General

Judgment

Question Presented: Whether the reserved election clause solely permits choosing from the terms of office of Presidents elected by the citizens, or also includes those chosen by Parliament.

Alleged Acts: The case comes before the court on Art. 19B(1) and 164. Art. 19B(1) introducing a reserved election where the office of the President is reserved for candidates of a particular community if no person from that particular community has held office for the five most recent terms of office. The law defined community as Chinese, Malay, Indian, and other minority communities. Three individuals held the office for five terms and were not Malay. Therefore, the 2017 election was reserved for a candidate from that community. The appellant argues that this does not apply to those candidates elected by Parliament, but only to those elected by the people, which would not reserve the office for a Malay candidate.

Procedural history: The appellant filed suit in the High Court seeking voidance of Art. 19 and 164. The High Court dismissed the application on July 7, 2017. The appellant appealed to the current court and the Court heard the case on expedited basis because the Government sought to issue a writ of election for the next presidential election. The appellant appealed the case stating that lower court erroneously stated that “President” applies to those both elected by the people and Parliament, that the last term of President Wee was set as the first term in the five, and that President Wee was elected by the citizens.

Summary: The court determined that the appellant’s argument was one based primarily on the text of the constitution. The Constitution defines a President as one elected under the Constitution, not necessarily those elected under 2016 Amendments. The appellant argued that only Presidents that underwent the prior reform process may not be counted or considered Presidents. However, the court rejected this because the legislative intent was not to preclude any of the previous Presidents under this and create an unworkable standard. Parliament has the authority to determine what “five more recent terms” means under the Constitution.

Conclusion: Parliament had the power to specify that President Wee’s last term was the first term in the five term count. The court dismissed the appeal.

Legal Issue(s)

Candidate Registration

Region: Asia-Pacific

Country: Singapore

Language of Decision

English

Court: Appellate Court

Election Type: Presidential

Date of decision: Aug 23, 2017

Geolocation

Latitude: 1.289765826

Longitude: 103.8511735

: Geolocation

Primary Documents

tan-cheng-bock-v-attorney-general-2017-sgca-50-(amended-on-131017)-pdf.pdf
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Election Judgments - IFES

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Tan Chen Bock v. Attorney General

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