Lim Eng Hock Peter v Lin Jian Wei and Another and Another Appeal
Jurisdiction | Singapore |
Court | Court of Three Judges (Singapore) |
Judge | Chan Sek Keong CJ |
Judgment Date | 08 October 2009 |
Neutral Citation | [2009] SGCA 48 |
Citation | [2009] SGCA 48 |
Published date | 14 October 2009 |
Date | 08 October 2009 |
Defendant Counsel | Ang Cheng Hock SC, William Ong, Kristy Tan and Ramesh Selvaraj (Allen & Gledhill LLP) |
Plaintiff Counsel | Alvin Yeo SC, Chan Hock Keng, Koh Swee Yen, Suegene Ang and Reina Chua (Wong Partnership LLP) |
Docket Number | Civil Appeals Nos 25 and 38 of 2009 |
Subject Matter | Defamation,Civil Procedure,Appeals,Tort |
8 October 2009 |
Judgment reserved. |
Chan Sek Keong CJ (delivering the judgment of the court):
Introduction
Background
7 The Raffles 5000 were dissatisfied with the Scheme and questioned the motives of the Company as they were aware that the Company had collected more than $500 million in entrance fees and also had an annual income stream of $20.4 million in subscription fees. They were surprised that the Company had no money to pay the damages and sought to appoint a special receiver and manager to examine the accounts of the Company. One of the matters that the Raffles 5000 wanted to look into was an item in the Company’s unaudited accounts showing that $124,213,169.46 had been paid out as dividends. They wanted to know when and to whom the dividends were paid. They also wanted to know what had happened to the $53 million collected in subscriptions from March 2000 to September 2002 and the yearly subscriptions of $19 million thereafter. The application to appoint a special receiver and manager was dismissed by the High Court on 22 September 2005 (see Re Raffles Town Club Pte Ltd
Alleged defamatory statements
1.4.4 Background to Company’s Current Financial Difficulties
All the original promoters, directors, and shareholders of the Company have left. At the time the new shareholders assumed control, a substantial portion of the monies collected in entrance fees had already been spent. An explanation of some of the more sizable expenses follows.
High start up costs
The 30-year leasehold site at the junction of Dunearn Road and Whitley Road on which the Club is erected was leased from the URA at a high price of $108,140,542.00, which reflected the robustness of the economy pre-Asian Financial Crisis. The sum of $108,140,542.00 includes stamp duty, property tax as well as interest levied for late completion. The costs of constructing the Club added another $107,574,209.00 to the bill. The unit cost of constructing the Club was $6,204.70 per square meter. Seah Choo Meng, a chartered quantity surveyor and Executive Chairman of Davis Langdon & Seah gave evidence of this number during the hearing before the Honourable Justice Belinda Ang in September 2004. He noted that this figure was the highest in his 37 years of experience.
Additionally, a sizeable portion of the entrance fees collected went towards pre-operating costs for the Club, which came up to $115,558,751.00. This included $79,535,510.00, the bulk of which were sales and marketing commissions paid to Europa Holdings Pte Ltd a company managed by former directors of the Company, Lawrence Ang Yee Lim, Dennis Foo Jong Long and William Tan Leong Ko. Sales and marketing commissions were paid to banks involved in the membership launches. Also included is the cost of processing the application forms received by members, which totalled $1,126,211.00. The Company believes that a bulk of the $1,126,211.00 was paid to Ms Chan Lay Hoon of JS Corporate Services and an Indonesian company, both engaged by Lim Eng Hock, Peter to assist in the processing of approximately 24,000 application forms. Ms Chan Lay Hoon was a director of the Company from July 1998 to April 2001.
Other expenditure include directors’ remuneration of $9,682,512.00 paid out between 1997 and March 2000, and staff and other payroll costs of $10,753,846.00. Moreover,...
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