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Construction firm boss inflates number of S’pore workers

A director of a construction firm admitted in court on Tuesday that he inflated the number of locals employed so he could hire more foreigners.

Kenneth Lim Ong Long, 73, pleaded guilty to 10 counts of accepting kickbacks and 10 counts of making a false declaration to the Controller of Work Passes, reported The Straits Times.

In these applications, he had said he was making Central Provident Fund (CPF) contributions to Singaporean employees to qualify for a hire quota to hire foreign workers.

The former director of Highsan Lim Enterprise also admitted to collecting S$6,000 from each of the 30 Chinese nationals he hired last year to recover their employment costs.

Employers of foreign workers are prohibited from demanding or receiving any benefit for hiring them.

The case will be heard again on 21 October, with the bail of S$15,000 extended.

The maximum punishment for accepting a kickback is a S$5,000 fine and a six-month jail term. For making each false declaration, one could be fined up to S$15,000 and jailed for up to a year.

Earlier in July, Mok Siew Meng, director of Kang Meng Marine Services Pte Ltd, was fined S$37,500 for receiving kickbacks.