‘Secret committee’ focusing solely on demolition clause in LKY's will: Lee Hsien Yang

Lee Hsien Yang has questioned the role of the Ministerial Committee that the Singapore government had said was set up to deliberate on exploring options for the house of the late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew.

The “secret committee” is “focusing solely on challenging the validity of the demolition clause” in his father’s final will, said Hsien Yang on his Facebook page on Friday (16 June). The committee is “entirely uninterested in exploring options” for the house at 38 Oxley Road, he added.

“Why does it take a committee of the highest paid ministers in the world to challenge a clause reiterating this well-known and publicly stated wish of our father? Is this not a matter for the family courts?” Hsien Yang said.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong released on Thursday a summary of statutory declarations to the Committee, which outlined his views about the “deeply troubling circumstances” concerning the making of the final will on 17 December 2013, among other issues.

In the summary, PM Lee said the demolition clause first appeared in the first will made on 20 August 2011. The late Lee wanted the removal of the clause and it was subsequently removed in the penultimate two wills (fifth and sixth), he said. But the clause “somehow found its way back into the Last Will”, he added.

In point 37 of the summary, PM Lee said, “In fact, there is no evidence that Mr Lee (Kuan Yew) even knew that the Demolition Clause had been re-inserted into the Last Will.”

“The Demolition Clause in the Last Will is now being used by Dr Lee Wei Ling and Mr Lee Hsien Yang to claim that Mr Lee (Kuan Yew) was firm in his wish that the house at 38 Oxley Road be demolished, and that he was not prepared to accept its preservation or contemplate options short of demolition,” said PM Lee, adding that there is no basis for their claims.

In a separate post on Facebook earlier Friday, Hsien Yang also referred to the demolition clause.

“Paragraph 7 (demolition clause) of the Will was drafted at LKY’s direction, and put into language by Lee Suet Fern his daughter in law and when he was satisfied he asked (Kwa) Kim Li (of Lee & Lee) to insert it into his will,” said Hsien Yang.

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