Wong Souk Yee v AG 47 [2019] SGCA 25 In the circumstances, having regard to Art 49(1) when read in its context, and the fact that it is common ground that there must have been a legislative oversight in the drafting of the amendments to the Constitution that were enacted in order to implement the GRC scheme, we are satisfied that Art 49(1) is ambiguous on its face. There are at least three possible interpretations of Art 49(1) and how it was intended to apply in the context of a single vacancy arising in a GRC: (a) the vacancy, as and when it arises, shall be filled by a by-election for all the seats in the GRC; (b) the vacancy shall only be filled by a by-election if and when all the seats in the GRC have been vacated; or (c) the “seat of a Member” in Art 49(1) refers only to the seat of a Member of an SMC, and Art 49(1) does not apply to seats in a GRC at all. 48 In the light of this ambiguity, the Appellant’s suggestion that extraneous material can only be relied upon to confirm the ordinary meaning of Art 49(1) (see [24] above) cannot be sustained. On the contrary, it is permissible to rely on extraneous material to ascertain the true meaning of Art 49(1) in relation to its application to GRCs (see Tan Cheng Bock at [54(c)(iii)(B)]). The extraneous material 49 When we turn to the extraneous material, Parliament’s intention as to how the GRC scheme was envisioned to operate in circumstances such as the present becomes abundantly clear. In short, it was never intended that a single vacancy in a GRC would trigger the obligation to call a by-election. 19