Ng Kee Shee v Fu Gaofei

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Tay Yong Kwang J
• Judgment Date: 14 September 2005
• Neutral Citation: [2005] SGHC 171
• Docket Number: Originating Summons (Family) No 55
• Date: 14 September 2005
• Year: 2005
• Published date: 19 September 2005
• Plaintiff Counsel: Ting Hi Keng (Yu and Co)
• Citation: [2005] SGHC 171
• Defendant Counsel: The defendant unrepresented and absent
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Subject Matter: Whether exceptional hardship existing to lift bar to divorce before lapse of three years from date of marriage,Circumstances amounting to "exceptional hardship" under s 94(2) Women's Charter,Section 94 Women's Charter (Cap 353, 1997 Rev Ed),Bars,Family Law,Divorce

14 September 2005

Tay Yong Kwang J:

1 This was an application under s 94 of the Women’s Charter (Cap 353, 1997 Rev Ed) made to a district judge of the Family Division of the Subordinate Courts for leave to be granted to the plaintiff (“the husband”) to present a petition for divorce before three years have passed since the date of the marriage. Section 94 provides:

(1) No petition for divorce shall be presented to the court unless at the date of the presentation of the petition 3 years have passed since the date of the marriage.

(2) The court may, upon application being made in accordance with the Rules of Court, allow a petition to be presented before 3 years have passed on the ground that the case is one of exceptional hardship suffered by the petitioner or of exceptional depravity on the part of the respondent, but if it appears to the court at the hearing of the petition that the petitioner obtained leave to present the petition by any misrepresentation or concealment of the nature of the case, the court may, if it pronounces a decree nisi, do so subject to the condition that no application to make the decree absolute shall be made until after the expiration of 3 years from the date of the marriage, or may dismiss the petition without prejudice to any petition which may be brought after the expiration of the said 3 years upon the same, or substantially the same, facts as those proved in support of the petition so dismissed.

(3) In determining any application under this section for leave to present a petition before the expiration of 3 years from the date of the marriage, the court shall have regard to the interest of any child of the marriage and to the question whether there is reasonable probability of a reconciliation between the parties before the expiration of the said 3 years.

(4) The court may, before determining an application under this section, refer the differences between the parties to a Conciliation Officer so that a reconciliation between the parties might be effected.

(5) Nothing in this section shall be deemed to prohibit the presentation of a petition based upon matters which have occurred before the expiration of 3 years from the date of the marriage.

The case for the plaintiff

2 The husband is an electrical engineer aged 42. The defendant (“the wife”) is 21 years old, residing in Wenchang City in the province of Hainan Island in the People’s Republic of China. They were married on 20 October 2004 through the assistance of a marriage agency.

3 The husband claimed he suffered exceptional hardship for the reasons that follow. After their marriage on 20 October 2004, the wife returned to her family home in Hainan Island on 9 January 2005 ostensibly to celebrate the Chinese New Year with her family. She left with her two female friends, Lin Yuyin (“Yuyin”) and Lin Qiongrui (“Qiongrui”), both of whom were also from Hainan Island. More than two months later, the wife has not returned to Singapore. She has not made any telephone call to the husband despite the fact that he had reminded her several times before her departure to call him every four or five days. She has also not written to him nor attempted to contact him in any way. The husband’s fear and suspicion that the wife has no intention of returning to Singapore were confirmed when he found that she had taken all her clothes and jewellery with her, leaving only a few inexpensive T-shirts and underwear which were being laundered at the time of her departure.

4 The husband telephoned Qiongrui’s husband, Toh Heng Leong (“Toh”), and found out that Qiongrui had also not returned to Singapore. Yuyin returned to Singapore in the middle of March 2005. On 8 March 2005, the husband and Toh visited Yuyin to ask her about their wives. The husband was told by her that the wife’s parents tried to persuade her to return to Singapore but she told them she would rather die than obey them. Yuyin then telephoned the wife and passed the receiver to the husband so that he could speak to her. The wife told him that their marriage was over, that she wanted a divorce and would never return to him. She also told him that she was willing to sign any document to enable him to obtain a divorce.

5 The husband also enumerated various examples of the wife’s “abnormal behaviour” while she was with him. During their honeymoon in Thailand, the wife refused to let him hold her hand by practically running away from him. She would also rebuff any attempt by him to place his arm over her shoulders and would warn him not to do so. She also refused to let him hug or kiss her. The wife refused to have sexual relations with him until the third day after the solemnisation of their marriage. When they finally had sex, she was unresponsive and refused to allow him to touch her face altogether.

6 The wife permitted the husband to have sex with her only once a week and would sleep as far away as possible from him on their bed, placing a bolster between them and turning away from him.

7 The wife would hold Qiongrui’s hand with their fingers intertwined and they would caress each other, even in the presence of and apparently oblivious of their husbands. The wife would also have long telephone conversations with Qiongrui, friends and relatives almost every day and night, which often went past midnight. Even when they were having their honeymoon in Thailand, she appeared more interested in making telephone calls than in him. She would stay overnight at Qiongrui’s home at every opportunity and he had to beg her to return to their matrimonial home. On one occasion, the husband and the wife were at the airport together with Yuyin, Qiongrui and their husbands to send off the wife’s mother and relatives. After the mother and relatives had left, the wife refused to get into the husband’s car and, when he insisted, she ran towards the highway as if to commit suicide. Yuyin’s husband ran after her and managed to catch hold of her before any accident could happen. The wife calmed down only after the husband relented and allowed her to stay overnight with Qiongrui at Yuyin’s home.

8 The wife also refused to put on her wedding ring despite the husband’s requests and finally did so only a few days before her departure. She also refused to accompany him on the once-a-week trip to the wet market, the only “chore” he requested of her as they had a maid in the home to do the housework.

9 The husband, being already past 40 years of age, was anxious to settle down and start a family and that was why he approached a marriage agency to help him find a wife. He spent a lot of money and went through a lot of trouble in order to marry the wife and thus felt cheated, humiliated and depressed. He wanted badly to be free again and be able to date and look for another life partner in order to restore his confidence with females. In view of what had already taken place, he made no attempt at reconciliation because he considered the marriage hopeless. He wished to petition for divorce on the ground of unreasonable behaviour on the part of the wife.

10 Yuyin, (who is) 32 years old, filed an affidavit stating that she is the cousin of Qiongrui, a friend of the wife. She said that Qiongrui and the wife grew up together in the same village in Hainan Island and had been schoolmates and colleagues and were practically inseparable. Both of them stayed with Yuyin when they first arrived in Singapore. After both of them got married, they would still stay overnight at Yuyin’s flat despite her exhortation to them to return to their husbands.

11 In Hainan Island, Yuyin asked the wife whether she would be returning to Singapore with her on 16 March 2005. The wife replied that she would rather die than return to the husband. When the husband tried to contact the wife several times, she refused to speak to him and also refused to give him her...