Rebel With A Cost

[Ed: Edits have been made since original time stamp. All information is current, and to the best of my knowledge, as of 230505 0253 AEST.]


There’s been a fair amount of commentary on the Singapore Rebel issue, with particularly informative ones by Akikonomu and Jacob George.



Here, I put together a pseudo-commentary of a few aspects I think are key to the issue. Note: IANAL, or any other kind of expert whatsoever. Inevitably, you will find a considerable amount of overlap with the aforementioned, since we are covering the same issue. Some new bits you may find useful, or redundant. Nevertheless, here’s my take on it.

[Be warned - it's long.]


REALM OF POWERS

The MDA was formed by a merger of the Singapore Broadcasting Authority, the Films and Publications Department, and the Singapore Film Commission (SFC), on 1 Jan 2003.

However, the Films Act under which the SFC is legislated is current only as of 2002 (1998 revised edition, last amended 2002).

This is why we haven’t seen any reference made to the relationship between, or distribution of powers of, the MDA and Film Censorship Board. Akikonomu has said that The MDA is in charge of the Film Board, and it should know that it has to first classify Mr See's documentary as a political film in order for the Film Act to be thrown at him.

Thing is, there is no legal obligation for the MDA to follow these instinctive ‘natural law’ procedures, even though the Board comes under the purview of the MDA, because of this legislative gap.


LEGALLY ILLIBERAL, OR PLAIN ILLEGAL?

It was indeed peculiar that the MDA lodged their complaint to the police, instead of the Film Censorship Board. After all, it is not the purview of the police to classify films, political or not. (Akikonomu has also raised this point.)

Here’s where it gets a little uncomfortable, presumably for the powers that be. Section 5(1) explicitly states:

Delegation of powers and duties by Board
5. —(1) The Board may, in its discretion, delegate to any Censor, Deputy or Assistant Censor of Films, either generally or in a particular case, all or any of the powers conferred and duties imposed upon it by this Act except the power —

(a) to prohibit the exhibition of a film;

AND Sec. 15 states:

Prohibition and approval of films for exhibition
15. —(1) After the submission of a film for the purpose of censorship, the Board may —

(a) approve the film for exhibition without alteration or excision;
(b) prohibit the exhibition of the film; or
(c) approve the film for exhibition with such alterations or excisions as it may require.

(2) The Board shall, in any case to which subsection (1) (b) or (c) applies, furnish to the owner in writing its reasons for the prohibition or for requiring the alterations or excisions.

Oh dear. It seems that the Board may be in breach of these 2 Sections. Let’s look at the facts:

i) The party calling for the withdrawal of Singapore Rebel (thereby prohibiting the exhibition of the film) was not the Board, but the organiser/s of SIFF.
ii) The Board is not empowered to delegate such prohibitional powers to SIFF.
iii) The owner of the film was not informed in writing its reasons for the prohibition of the film. In fact, neither the Board nor MDA had made any contact with Martyn See.
iv) Neither the police nor the courts are empowered under the Film Act to decide whether a film is a political film.

Are we understanding the implications of these collective counts of (potential) breach?


A BIT OF IRONY

The MDA says that the first aim of the MDA is to ‘promote the growth of the media industry’. Well, with the eyes of the international media on the Singapore Rebel case, they’ve certainly achieved this quite spectacularly.

More ironic, however, is this: The setting up of MDA is in response to the convergence of different media that requires a consistent approach in developing and managing the different forms of media.

Consistent, right.

Like how Singapore Rebel is a party political film, but CNA’s Up Close feature on 6 ruling party Ministers is not. (Next section elaborates.)


SELECTIVE LEGISLATION?

Jacob George has suggested that CNA seems to have a way out, when the Act states that "For the avoidance of doubt, any film which is made solely for the purpose of — reporting of current events.." is "not a party political film".

A problem lies in the vagueness of wording of the Act itself. What can be claimed as ‘pure reportage of current events’ by an investigative journalist such as John Pilger, or film-maker such as Martyn See, may at once be deemed as a ‘party political film’ if the MDA (it should technically be the Film Board) so interprets as such. This applies both ways.

I could, in fact, argue that what seems to be more a profile feature on 6 political leaders of the Powerful Autocratic People rather than ‘coverage of current affairs’ would qualify more as a party political film than Singapore Rebel - but hey. My word is nothing against that of a Man In White, who could probably throw me into an approved warehouse to reflect upon my subversive disturbances to the internal security of Singapore.




SUBMISSION, NOT SUBMISSIVENESS

Contrary to some existing posts on the topic, Martyn See did in fact submit Singapore Rebel to the Board for approval. From Martyn's comment:

It was a non-finalist entry at the Singapore International Film Festival short film competition and the festival had submitted the film for the purpose of exhibiting it at the Goethe Institute. If passed by the censors, it would have been screened along with all the other non-finalist entries to an audience of about 80 people, and not all of whom would be interested in watching a little self-made video of a lonely opposition figure.

GRAND ARCHITECTS OF THE LAW

The Powerful Autocratic People, of course, are the Grand Architects in our little matrix of existence. See how, in Sec. 3, they have made sure there is no way our fine Asian conservative values could be violated:

Board of Film Censors and appointment of officers
3. —(1) There shall be established a Board of Film Censors consisting of not less than 3 members including a Chairman, all of whom shall be Censors of Films appointed by the Minister.

(2) The Minister may appoint such Deputy and Assistant Censors of Films and such Inspectors of Films as he may think fit.

(3) The Minister may, by notification in the Gazette, appoint an officer to be the Licensing Officer for the purposes of this Act and may similarly appoint such number of Assistant Licensing Officers as may be necessary.

What excellent foresight. Now we can be certain our children will not be exposed to questionable material, or our youth influenced by those ‘western ideas of democracy’, since the Minister himself appoint the censors officers one leh.

Just to show you how robust our model of spick-and-span media is built on an even more robust, spick-and-span model of democracy (in Sec. 4):

Procedure of Board
4. —(1) The Board may act notwithstanding any vacancy in its membership.

(2) The quorum at all meetings of the Board shall be 2 in addition to the Chairman.

(3) The Chairman shall have a casting vote in addition to his deliberative vote.

So, it doesn’t matter even if certain ‘dubious’ members of the Board become Singapore Rebels themselves, and express dissent to the decisions of the Board through their absence; the meeting is still valid. Don’t forget, all you need are 2 more lackeys loyal followers of the Chairman, who, of course, is himself a lackey of appointed by the Minister.


WE ARE ALL CRIMINALS

As Akikonomu has pointed out, what ”film” means in Sec. 2(1) means that any wedding or birthday video is is a ‘film’. May I add that this would also include all videos taken with our cute little mobile phones and fancy cameras. Yes, even that silly 7-second clip of my friend Ah Beng rolling up his yellow Armani pants.

As such, Sec. 21(1) renders us all who have such ‘films’ in our possession, as criminals – no less than Martyn See is, anyway:

Penalty for possession, exhibition or distribution of uncensored films
21. —(1) Any person who —

(a) has in his possession;
(b) exhibits or distributes; or
(c) reproduces,

any film without a valid certificate, approving the exhibition of the film, shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction

Herein lies another problem with the wording of the Act. In the last clause above, the Act declares such a person as described in Sec. 21(1) as guilty of an offence, suggesting the Act is to play the judicial role, not our State's judiciary; or that there is simply no judicial process in such circumstances. It then continues, 'shall be liable on conviction', suggesting a trial in court. What exactly are the implications of sub-clauses (a), (b) or (c) being affirmative again?

May I bring to your attention that conviction without trial is a violation of our Constitution, as per Sec. 9(3):

Liberty of the person
9. —(3) Where a person is arrested, he shall be informed as soon as may be of the grounds of his arrest and shall be allowed to consult and be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice.

Unless, of course, Martyn See is deemed to be such a threat to 'public safety, peace and good order' that the exemption in Sec. 9(6) must be applied:

(6) Nothing in this Section shall invalidate any law —
(a) in force before the commencement of this Constitution which authorises the arrest and detention of any person in the interests of public safety, peace and good order;

Moving back to the Films Act. What truly is the clincher - for our shining model of democracy - is the exemption specified in Sec. 40(1):

Exemptions
40. —(1) This Act shall not apply to —
(a) any film sponsored by the Government;

So yes. Under this, CNA - and all other official Singapore media - would be exempt, if it is true (could it possibly be? *gasp*) that Singapore’s mainstream media is controlled, directly or indirectly, by the Singapore government.

This also means that the ruling party can, (election period or not), broadcast programs about its Ministers, (election candidate or not), whereas anyone else, (opposition party or not), will become a felon in this free and democratic country.


APPEALING THE ARCHITECTS

In this case, because there has been no available documentation of the Board’s classification of Singapore Rebel as a ‘party political film’, Martyn See will not be able to make an appeal under Sec. 24 – since it cannot be proven that this was a decision of the Board to begin with:

Appeals
24. —(1) Any owner of a film aggrieved by any act or decision of the Board may, within 30 days of the date on which he is notified thereof, and on payment of such fee as may be prescribed, appeal to a Committee of Appeal by lodging with the Secretary a written notice of appeal.

***
Therefore, since Martyn See has flagrantly threatened the stability, security and racial harmony of Singapore unilaterally, with the making of the yet-to-be-classified-but-alleged party political film Singapore Rebel, I hereby, by no powers of the Republic of Singapore vested in me, declare Martyn See guilty under Sec. 33 and shall be arrested under Sec. 23, and shall be subject to juducial ruling under Sec. 21, determining:

A fine of not less than $500 for each such film he had exhibited, distributed or reproduced, as the case may be (but not to exceed in the aggregate $40,000) or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 6 months or to both.

Because, you know, we must ‘protect core values’ and safeguard the interests of our conservative Party majority.

***
[Ed: Feel free to point out any mistakes I may have made - other than publishing this post, that is. For those who want to keep this for reference, I suggest you copy+paste before this blog gets shut down.]


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