Cheong Wei Chang v Lee Hsien Loong and another matter
Judge | Valerie Thean J |
Judgment Date | 05 October 2018 |
Neutral Citation | [2018] SGHC 217 |
Citation | [2018] SGHC 217 |
Defendant Counsel | Sivakumar Ramasamy and Gabriel Lim (Attorney-General's Chambers),Sui Yi Siong (Eversheds Harry Elias LLP) as Young Amicus Curiae. |
Published date | 12 October 2018 |
Hearing Date | 24 September 2018 |
Plaintiff Counsel | The plaintiff in Suit 489 of 2018/defendant in Originating Summons 1071 of 2018 in person |
Docket Number | Suit No 489 of 2018 (Summons No 2809 of 2018) and Originating Summons No 1071 of 2018 |
Court | High Court (Singapore) |
Date | 05 October 2018 |
Subject Matter | Vexatious litigant,Courts and Jurisdiction,Civil Procedure,Striking out,Inherent powers |
Access to the courts is a fundamental aspect of the rule of law. At the same time, the services provided by the courts are the resource of the community as a whole. Litigants who pursue claims with vexatious persistence take up a disproportionate amount of attention, to the detriment of other claims and the needs of other litigants. For the vexatious litigant himself, and often his family, such continuous litigation also exacts a financial, emotional and mental cost.
Section 74(1) of the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Cap 322, 2007 Rev Ed) (“SCJA”) addresses a part of this concern by requiring vexatious litigants to first seek the leave of the court before filing further action. Section 74 of the SCJA reads as follows:
Vexatious litigants
The use of this statutory mechanism carries specific criteria and outcomes. This judgment considers, taking into account the court’s statutory powers, the reach of the court’s inherent powers to regulate and restrain proceedings by vexatious litigants.
Background On 5 February 2018, Mr Cheong Wei Chang (“Mr Cheong”), filed Suit No 125 of 2018 (“Suit 125”) against Mr Lee Hsien Loong (“Mr Lee”). His Statement of Claim asserted the following:1
The Statement of Claim listed “supporting reasons” as follows:2
The Statement of Claim enclosed two volumes of documents which were labelled “Supporting Documents 1” and “Supporting Documents 2” respectively. Mr Cheong subsequently tendered a further set of supporting documents labelled “Trial Document 1”. The documents comprised miscellaneous pictures pertaining to a variety of problems, generally with a caption on the side. The pictures and captions traversed a wide variety of topics including, but not limited to, failed job interviews, errors in finance textbooks and health problems. I give three examples for illustration:
The Attorney-General (“the AG”) acted for Mr Lee in those proceedings. The AG took the view that s 19(3) of the Government Proceedings Act (Cap 121, 1985 Rev Ed) (“GPA”) mandates that proceedings against the Government should be instituted against the Attorney-General where no specific Government department is appropriate. Mr Lee was not being sued in his personal capacity, but rather in his capacity as Prime Minister and head of the Government. Therefore, the AG’s view was that the AG, and not Mr Lee, ought to have been named as the defendant. Whilst that was his view, rather than rest his case on this technical irregularity, he decided to proceed with an application to strike out Mr Cheong’s claim on the ground that it was frivolous, vexatious and disclosed no reasonable cause of action.
On 30 April 2018, I struck out the action for the reason that it disclosed no reasonable cause of action. In brief, Mr Cheong’s claim was that Mr Lee or the Prime Minister’s Office were imposing regulations on his activities. He appeared to be asking for a contract, or for the disclosure of a contract that regulated his activities. Mr Cheong did not, however, plead any facts which demonstrated that Mr Lee or any person from the Prime Minister’s Office had offered any terms to Mr Cheong, or had accepted any offers made by Mr Cheong. The factual premise of Mr Cheong’s contention on being regulated was similarly incoherent. First, Mr Cheong did not plead any facts which demonstrated the existence of any “regulations” that originated from Mr Lee or the Prime Minister’s Office. Second, there were no facts which demonstrated how the “regulations” caused or contributed to the host of problems he had identified in his supporting documents. The details provided in the supporting documents appeared to be a collation of conspiracy theories with no supporting facts. To use the allegation identified at [6(b)] above as an example, it was difficult to understand how and why Mr Lee or the staff in the Prime Minister’s Office or in fact any government body would have any role in Mr Cheong’s interview at Citibank. Even where public servants were involved, such as in [6(c)] above, it was clear that whatever requirements that were imposed upon him were of general application and to the extent that he was suggesting that he was somehow unfairly treated, that could not be sustained. There was simply no basis to suggest that the vicissitudes of life faced by Mr Cheong were caused by the Prime Minister or his department.
On 9 May 2018, a day after a copy of the extracted order of court in Suit 125 was served on Mr Cheong, Mr Cheong filed Suit No 489 of 2018 (“Suit 489”). This suit, which is the suit that presently concerns the court, named Mr Lee as the defendant again. The substance of the Statement of Claim filed for Suit 489 was similar to the earlier Statement of Claim filed, requesting as follows:7
The new Statement of Claim enclosed a volume of documents labelled “Trial Document 1 (May 2018)”, which was almost identical to the volume of documents labelled “Trial Document 1”, which Mr Cheong had tendered previously. The Statement of Claim provided a “Description of Trial Document 1 (May 2018)”, which was as follows:8
The AG took the same view as he did in the earlier suit, that while he ought to have been the named defendant because of the GPA, the best course was to apply to strike out the action. An application to do so was made on 19 June 2018 by way of Summons No 2809 of 2018, which is the summons before me. In this summons, in addition to the first prayer to strike out the action, the AG asked for the following:9
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