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Tan Cheng Bock v AG [2017] SGCA 50 5.36 … the Commission considers that the hiatus-triggered model is the best model of those it examined, entailing the lowest degree of intrusiveness. … Most importantly, it has a “natural sunset” – if free and unregulated elections produce Presidents from a varied distribution of ethnicities, the requirement of a reserved election will never be triggered. It will only be invoked when there has been an exceedingly long period of time during which no member of a particular ethnic minority has occupied the Presidency, which is a scenario that the Commission would agree is “worrying”. … 5.39 All things considered, the Commission proposes setting “x” at the value of 5, as that would strike the right balance between these competing considerations. On this basis, a reserved election would be triggered if no candidate from a particular racial group has held the office of President for 30 years or more. 5.40 … An election is reserved for racial group A because no candidate from racial group A has been elected for 5 consecutive terms. … [emphasis added] 113 The Appellant also highlighted the following statements in the White Paper as supporting his view about the specific mischief Parliament sought to address: 81. Based on these principles, the Commission recommended a “hiatus-triggered” safeguard mechanism that operates as follows: … (b) In the Commission’s view, this was the “best model” amongst those that were studied. Most importantly, it has a “natural sunset”. A reserved election will never arise if free and unregulated elections produce Presidents of varied ethnicities. It will only be invoked if there has not been a President of a given ethnicity for an “exceedingly long period”. 55

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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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