When she was telephoned last week to discuss a film that she had recently produced, Singaporean activist Chee Siok Chin said to phone during lunch time as the rest of the day she would be on trial. The charge against her is assembly without a permit for a protest she helped organise in 2006 against the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
Chee has also been summoned for questioning by police over the 40-minute film One Nation Under Lee, which she produced. Directed by Seelan Palay, it is a recent critique of Singapore's rulers, from the city state's grand patriarch Lee Kuan Yew to his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. The film begins by detailing how the elder Lee largely eradicated the free press and jailed scores of dissidents during his first years as prime minister in the 1960s, including suspected communist Chia Thye Poh, who was held without trial for 32 years.
Later, animated political cartoons take swipes at Singapore's exorbitant prime ministerial salary and its ranking of 141 of 167 nations in terms of press freedom by Reporters Without Borders. Documentation of recent protests, arrests and calls for civil disobedience and freedom round out the film, which closes with the American civil rights anthem We Shall Overcome.
One Nation Under Lee is banned in Singapore but a quick internet search yields a number of free downloads. Just about a year ago, the film's official premiere was interrupted by the government, even though it was held privately at a hotel for about 80 invited guests. 'The police called us the night before and warned us not to show the film,' Chee says. 'At the end of the screening, they burst into the room and seized the DVD.'
In 2005, director Martyn See produced the 15-minute short Singapore Rebel, a documentary on persecuted opposition politician Chee Soon Juan, Chee Siok Chin's brother; that's another easy download. That film was not only banned, police also confiscated See's camera, computer and master tapes as part of a year-long investigation that came to nothing.
Cumulative embarrassment over such censorship may have also provoked amendments to the national Film Act last month. Even though ostensibly a move towards liberalisation, the changes were slammed as 'a giant step backwards' by opposition lawmaker Sylvia Lim. While the new law allows 'factual' political documentaries, films that portray illegal acts (such as protesting against the government) or include, in the words of Senior Minister of State Lui Tuck Yew, 'animation and dramatisation and distort what is real or factual' remain illegal.