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Madam, Singapore and its various Government Ministries and agencies have achieved a reputation
we have strict procedures to ensure that our procurement systems adhere to the highest
and most rigorous standards. I think that defence experts acknowledged this. For example, credible defence
journals such as the Jane's Defence Weekly and Jane's Defence Industry have acknowledged our robust and comprehensive system for
procurement. The Financial Times also noted, the "stringency and transparency" of our processes
while the Aviation Week publication lauded Singapore's Defence Ministry as a "reference
customer" and a "model of cost-effectiveness" to suppliers and buyers of defence equipment.
Among global defence companies, it is common knowledge that MINDEF buys equipment at
very competitive prices and has stringent standards of performance for its purchases.
So the difference between MINDEF's hard-earned and well-known reputation of being stringent,
transparent and cost-effective in our procurement practices, and that of transparency International's
defence corruption risk reports which places us in the same category as countries like
Afghanistan and Iraq, point to a credibility gap of TI's reports.
We examined TI's assessment and found their assumptions to be flawed and processes
weak. For example, TI stated that while there is "no evidence of illicit economic activity",
They furthered went on to add "we may assume some off-budget allocations, perhaps on a limited basis".
I don't know what the basis of that assumption is, but it is a very serious allegation.
Further, the evaluator, a person called Mr David Fouquet, added that he has "on good personal authority"
that there was a phantom employee on the Ministry of Defence's payroll, without giving any details
We would suggest to TI that their processes need to be strengthened by relying
on more authoritative sources and substantiated facts. In fact, TI's analysis seems to be
based mainly on Internet sources. We have endeavoured to reach out to this organisation to give them more information,
but they have flatly declined our offers of more information
to debunk these false assertions. TI also asserts that "parliamentary and legislature
to scrutinise the defence budget is not robust due to a lack of opposition voices in the
political system". This is a re-hash of old debates that if Singapore does not conform
closely to their model of parliamentary democracy, we must be corrupt. TI's reports do injustice
to our Members of Parliament here and ignore the strong legislative oversight as well as strong
executive controls in our system. The Defence Budget is presented and passed
by Parliament and approved by the President each year. The Parliament appoints a Select
Committee, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), to work closely with the Auditor-General's
Office to conduct regular scrutiny of the Government's expenditure and accounts. This
is further complemented by strong executive oversight, with a robust system of checks
and balances, an independent Auditor-General who reports to the President, and a clean
Civil Service. Detailed information on our anti-corruption, budget, audit and procurement
checks and balances are available online on the public websites.
In fact, more established publications such as the Asian Intelligence Report by the Political
& Economic Risk Consultancy Limited consistently ranked Singapore as the least corrupt country
in Asia since 2002. Other reputable publications such as the "Governance Matters" report published
by the World Bank Institute, has consistently
ranked Singapore in the top 5% percentile out of over 200 countries, in the area of
Control of Corruption. The findings from this "Governance Matters" report are drawn from
over 20 different indicators, some of which include reputable sources such as the Economist
Intelligence Unit and the World Competitiveness Yearbook by the renowned Switzerland-based
International Institute for Management Development. Indeed, TI's Headquarters' most recent Corruption
Perception Index 2013, placed Singapore as the fifth least corrupt nation in the world,
The fact that the same organisation, albeit through two different
publications, gives us wide different assessments, again calls into question
TI's credibility. My ministry reiterates that we are committed to
upholding Singapore's reputation as a country that is clean,
honest and trustworthy, and a ministry which emphasises the highest levels of integrity and incorruptibility.