Question: Can I get your comments on the case of the Bangladeshi preacher, Amir Hamza, who gave a sermon to foreign workers in a dormitory on 9 Aug?
Minister Shanmugam: Amir Hamza came to Singapore. He spoke to workers from Bangladesh. He himself is from Bangladesh. He gave the talk at a dormitory in Tuas, called Lantana Lodge.
The Internal Security Department came to know of his sermon.
And what was of concern is that he made many extremist, segregationist statements.
His preachings, from what we can see in the past, run down secular values, promote religious intolerance, disparages non-Muslims.
He is also reported to be involved with an organisation called Ansar al-Islam. This organisation, Ansar al-Islam, is a pro-Al-Qaeda organisation in Bangladesh.
Amir was arrested in 2021 for extremism, inciting militancy.
His speeches are reported to have influenced an Ansar al-Islam member to plot to attack the Bangladeshi Parliament.
Amir Hamza, himself is currently on bail in Bangladesh, from what we understand, waiting for trial.
Question: How did he enter Singapore?
Minister Shanmugam: His name is in our database, and we would have picked him up. But what he did was that he used a passport with a name that is slightly different from what we had in our database. And from all appearances, it looks like a validly issued passport. It appears to be a validly issued passport. And we did not have his biometrics at that point in time.
Now, you have got to remember - people from all over the world come into Singapore.
We have to keep the airport experience user-friendly. People have to feel welcomed to Singapore.
At the same time: ICA has a task of guarding against people like Amir Hamza coming into Singapore.
So it is actually a very difficult one. You have heard in the past, us saying so-and-so has been prevented from coming, so-and-so has been blocked. We have told preachers from other countries that they cannot enter, we’ve turned them off at the airport. He slipped through because of this passport issue. He seems to have a legitimate passport with a different name.
And it is always not easy when people do that. And it’s a balance that we have to strike, and in this case, he managed to get through.
Question: Other than what you have told us, can you tell us a bit more about what he says in his sermon?
Minister Shanmugam: In Singapore in his sermon, he suggested that non-Muslims were “kafirs” - that means infidels. He held up extremists as exemplars of religious piety. And he told his audience – the Bangladeshi workers – that they should do the same.
He praised a number of individuals he named; they are said to have links to terrorism themselves.
He also encouraged the audience to watch videos of a person named Motiur Rahman Nizami. Motiur is the alleged mastermind behind a massacre in 1971, where hundreds of Hindus were killed in Bangladesh.
Question: Minister, what is being done moving forward? Two fronts – so, when it comes to Amir Hamza himself, are you all trying to locate him or get in touch with him? And, on the homefront, were there slip-ups and lapses and will reviews be conducted in the work processes?
Minister Shanmugam: Amir Hamzah left on the 10th. The matter is being investigated.
It affects our national security and is contrary to our values, the things that he said.
The organiser of the talk is also under investigation. Organiser did not apply for a Police permit, which he should have applied for. As regards whether we will review our processes, there are a number of parts to this.
I made the point – the airport is not a cantonment. You cannot be interviewing every person who is coming in, as if he is, or he may be a potential radical; or someone who might be a radical. Remember, the airport experience has to be good, people have to feel welcomed coming into Singapore.
Two, organisers in Singapore have to follow the rules and the people who organised it will be taken to task because they did not follow the rules. They did not apply.
He came in like any other person would, and he came in on a valid passport – from all that we can see – so what is it that you think ICA could have done differently?
What they could have done differently is go and identify every single person who is coming and asking them detailed questions.
Imagine what that would do to the airport experience and our tourism industry.
So you must accept that sometimes these things will happen – not because of our fault – because we have the capability of picking up false passports – but if people are able to get extra passports in their countries; and I am speaking without full knowledge of the facts, or maybe this was an extremely good forgery, or perhaps if there was some reason why his name was reflected differently on his passport. We can only speculate. But on the face of it, he was no different from any other person who is coming into Singapore.
We cannot work backwards on this, but we have to see what has happened. We will look at it, bearing in mind that we need to make sure that we balance the security needs with the needs of the economy too.
Question: Does this mean Singapore is facing a problem of radicalisation among the Bangladeshi migrant worker community?
Minister Shanmugam: Not quite.
Taking one step back, we make it clear in Singapore that whether it is Singaporeans or foreigners, you can proselytise, you say good things about your own race or religion, but you cannot run down somebody else of some other race or religion.
And our laws are quite tough on that.
Foreign preachers – when their applications are made and their names are given, we usually check that, and sometimes we have said “No, you can’t come in.”.
And I’ve explain how this gentleman came in.
And specific to our Bangladeshi workers in Singapore, the vast, overwhelming majority of them are law-abiding.
If I give you some statistics – since 2015 to now, about 9 plus years – because we don’t have the full statistics for this year – ISD has investigated about 40 odd Bangladeshi workers, and there are over 200,000 Bangladeshi workers in Singapore now.
The figure has fluctuated up and down, so 200,000 now, is a significant number – even previously – and 40 plus is a very small number.
But we don’t take chances.
We continuously work with the different communities.
We make it clear to them what is accepted in Singapore and what is not accepted in Singapore. And we will take action against anyone who attacks another race or religion.
As I said – and some of you may remember – some years ago, we acted against a number of Bangladeshi workers who were on track, in our view, [to] becoming more radicalised. They were practising silent killing, getting brochures on how to kill. They were meeting in mosques to talk to each other, sending money for terrorist-related activities overseas. And we sent the whole lot back. But on the whole, I would say, ISD is in control.
Question: Can we know who invited him in and how many workers participated in the sermon, and are there any signs that they have terrorist inclination?
Minister Shanmugam: They were in a dormitory. The organisers are being investigated. Precisely who is involved, how many workers were there, these are matters of detail subject to investigation and I should not be going into those details at this point.
Question: Those workers who signed up to hear him speak, are they being addressed after the sermon was complete? What are the steps that was followed up after the sermon?
Minister Shanmugam: ISD is following up on that. Again, it’s running in parallel with investigations so I wouldn’t go too much into it.
