wow didnt expected that. So may I know what is consider as seditious posts in your definition?
The Sedition Act[15] criminalizes seditious acts and speech; and the printing, publication, sale, distribution, reproduction and importation of seditious publications. The maximum penalty for a first offender is a fine of up to S$5,000 or imprisonment not exceeding three years or both, and for a subsequent offender imprisonment not exceeding five years. The court is required to forfeit any seditious publication found in an offender's possession or used in evidence at the trial, and may order that it be destroyed or otherwise disposed of.[16] No person may be convicted on the uncorroborated testimony of a single witness.[17]
As the Act defines something as seditious if it has a "seditious tendency",[18] a crucial element underpinning the offences mentioned above is the requirement to prove a seditious tendency which is defined in sections 3(1) and (2):
3.— (1) A seditious tendency is a tendency —
(a) to bring into hatred or contempt or to excite disaffection against the Government;
(b) to excite the citizens of Singapore or the residents in Singapore to attempt to procure in Singapore, the alteration, otherwise than by lawful means, of any matter as by law established;
(c) to bring into hatred or contempt or to excite disaffection against the administration of justice in Singapore;
(d) to raise discontent or disaffection amongst the citizens of Singapore or the residents in Singapore;
(e) to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore.
(2) Notwithstanding subsection (1), any act, speech, words, publication or other thing shall not be deemed to be seditious by reason only that it has a tendency —
(a) to show that the Government has been misled or mistaken in any of its measures;
(b) to point out errors or defects in the Government or the Constitution as by law established or in legislation or in the administration of justice with a view to the remedying of such errors or defects;
(c) to persuade the citizens of Singapore or the residents in Singapore to attempt to procure by lawful means the alteration of any matter in Singapore; or
(d) to point out, with a view to their removal, any matters producing or having a tendency to produce feelings of ill-will and enmity between different races or classes of the population of Singapore,
if such act, speech, words, publication or other thing has not otherwise in fact a seditious tendency.
Although this statutory definition broadly corresponds to its common law counterpart,[19] there are two key differences. First, unlike the common law offence which requires evidence of a seditious intent, an offender's intention is irrelevant under the Sedition Act,[20] and it suffices that the act possesses the requisite seditious tendency.[21] Thus, it is immaterial that the offender failed to foresee or misjudged the risk that his or her act would be seditious.[22]
Secondly, section 3(1)(e) differs from the classic common law idea of sedition because there is no requirement that the seditious tendency has to be directed against the maintenance of government. A District Court held in Public Prosecutor v. Ong Kian Cheong (2009)[23] that on a plain and literal reading, there is no suggestion that Parliament intended to embody the common law of seditious libel into section 3(1)(e).[24] Since prosecutions under the Sedition Act since 1966 have been based on section 3(1)(e), a distinctive feature of the use of the Act in the 21st century is that it has primarily been employed to deal with disruptions to racial and religious harmony.[25]
