SO EASY BECOME CLERK IN SINKIELAND. I SUSPECT THIS IS BS STORY, PROBABLY STAY HERE TO SELL HER CHEEBYE.
Foreigner bought 'freedom work permit' from syndicate to stay in Singapore with boyfriend, gets jail
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BY
LYDIA LAM
Published June 25, 2024Updated June 25, 2024
SINGAPORE — Wanting to enter Singapore during the Covid-19 pandemic to be with her Singaporean boyfriend, a Taiwanese woman illegally bought a "freedom work pass" from a syndicate that sold such passes to foreigners.
Although she indicated in her application for a work permit that she would be working as a clerk, she instead worked illegally as a night club hostess.
Wang Ting-I, 41, was nabbed by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) after it began investigating a series of cases where foreign nationals illegally purchased work passes from a syndicate by making false declarations in their work permit applications.
The investigations, which began in 2021, uncovered a prevalence of cases in which foreigners bought such passes to enter and remain in Singapore during the pandemic when they faced travel restrictions.
According to a judgment made available on Tuesday (June 25), Wang was sentenced to six weeks' jail for one count of conspiring with her boyfriend to make a false statement in her work pass application.
A second charge of working as a hostess at a nightclub without a valid work permit for over a year was taken into consideration.
THE CASE
According to Wang's lawyer, Mr Ranjit Singh from Francis Khoo & Lim law firm, Wang previously worked in Singapore as a waitress or "entertainment artiste" from 2015 to July 2020.She met her boyfriend, Derrick Ong Yong Jit, through mutual friends in September 2019, Mr Singh said.
The couple began dating in January 2020 and had a long-distance relationship after Wang had to return to Taiwan in July 2020, when her work permit extension was rejected by MOM.
This was during the Covid-19 "circuit breaker" period, when non-essential activities were not allowed.
According to Mr Singh, the couple explored avenues for Wang to return to Singapore despite the travel restrictions and circuit breaker measures.
A friend introduced them to a company known as Oleegey, which offered "freedom work permits" to foreigners for a monthly fee to maintain the levies for the work passes, said the defence lawyer.
He said the couple was "misguided and clouded by their emotions" and decided to buy the work permit so Wang could return to Singapore.
According to court documents, Ong approached an agent known only as Lin to buy the permit for Wang. He explained to Wang that this was a "freedom work permit", where she did not need to work for the company stated in the work permit.
The intention of purchasing the work permit was so Wang could stay in Singapore and be with Ong while they arranged to get married.
The application was submitted to MOM's Work Pass Division in November 2020, and Wang was later issued a work pass.
Wang and Ong paid the agent S$1,300 monthly to maintain the work pass.
However, Wang never worked as a clerk for Oleegey — a company that supposedly produces pre-cast components — as stated in her work pass.
Instead, she worked as a hostess at a nightclub along Prinsep Street one to two times a week from January 2021 to March 2022.
In total, she earned an estimated average of S$12,000 to S$24,000 through tips from her customers at the nightclub.
Wang married Ong in May 2022 in Singapore, but MOM uncovered her offences and she was arrested, with her work permit cancelled two days after she got married.
DEFENCE SOUGHT FINE, CITING PANDEMIC
The prosecution sought six to seven weeks' jail for Wang, while the defence sought a fine of S$3,500 or not more than four weeks' jail, citing the unique circumstances caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.Mr Singh said his client was not "seeking to circumvent both the employment and immigration policies in Singapore to obtain employment in Singapore".
Instead, he claimed she had committed this "technical" offence only due to her deep love for Ong.
Mr Singh also said Wang worked in her friends' nightclub only to "help them out when they were short-handed and not for financial gain".
He said any jail term would have potentially "dire" consequences that are disproportionate to the mistake she made, including deportation which would separate her from Ong and prevent them from starting a family.
In response, the prosecutor said the fact that the couple got married eventually should not be given much weight.
There were previous cases where offenders pleaded guilty similarly to buying work passes to be with their loved ones.
JUDGE'S FINDINGS
District Judge Lorraine Ho said there was a prevalence of cases involving foreigners who bought work passes from syndicates with no intention to work for the specified work pass employers.Foreigners used their purchased work passes during the pandemic in a bid to enter Singapore "for a variety of reasons", said Judge Ho.
She said there were no cases since the relevant act came into effect where a fine was imposed. Instead, there were 22 cases where jail was imposed.
Judge Ho added that Wang's deception was maintained for "an extremely long time of one year and five months" and did not surrender on her own accord — instead, it was discovered by MOM.
While Wang was not part of the syndicate which ran the company to sell work passes to foreigners, the offence was committed as part of a syndicate's operations, said the judge.
"This was because the accused had, as a customer of the syndicate, knowingly agreed to purchase the work permit from Lin from the syndicate, and in order to maintain the deception and upkeep her work permit, she agreed and paid the syndicate S$1,300 per month towards the work permit levy," she said.
On the defence's point that a jail term might result in Wang's deportation and ban from re-entering Singapore, Judge Ho said this "could not be and has never been a sentencing consideration to be relied upon by the courts in determining the appropriate sentence to impose".
"Any decision on the potential deportation of a convicted offender is not within the purview of the courts but the relevant authorities like the ICA," said the judge.
"The courts play no part in this. The courts also do not play a part in deciding whether anyone's special pass issued by the ICA would be cancelled at any time."
According to a gazette notification from the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA), Oleegey was struck off from the Register of Companies in 2023.
Wang is appealing against the sentence and is currently on bail. CNA
