A former deputy director of the Football Association of Singapore (FAS) who was charged in court on allegations of conspiring to cheat the football body looks set to plead guilty.
TMSG understands that Rikram Jit Singh, who was slapped with 45 charges for alleged corrupt practices during his tenure with the football body, will plead guilty at the next hearing.
A court posting on the official judiciary website confirms that the case will be heard on 3 January 2024 as a “plead guilty” hearing.
Bail was set at $200,00 in one surety or $100,000 in two sureties.
BACKGROUND INTO THE CASE
On 9 December 2020, the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) said in a statement that four individuals would be charged in court for conspiring to cheat the FAS.
Rikram had been dismissed from his position at the FAS from January 2019 onwards after a whistleblower highlighted the alleged actions which were ongoing.
The four who were taken to task were Rikram, a 43-year-old male Singaporean, who was the deputy director (Commercial & Business Development) of the FAS at the time of the offences, his wife Asya Kirin Binte Kames, a 36-year-old female Singaporean, who was listed as the Director of All Resource Network from 20 April 2017 to 1 October 2017, Shankar Suppiah, a 46-year-old male Singaporean who was a Director of ARN from 1 October 2017 onwards and Pallaniappan Ravindran, a Director of Myriad Sports & Events Pte Ltd at the time of the offences.
Rikram is alleged to have conspired with his wife Asya, and in some instances with Shankar, to cheat the FAS.
Invoices from ARN had been submitted to the FAS, which dishonestly concealed Rikram’s alleged involvement in ARN.
This alleged dishonesty induced the FAS to award the jobs to ARN, and deliver a sum amounting to $181,875 to ARN between 2017 and 2018.
For this, Rikram and Asya faced 28 charges.
In addition, Rikram and Asya faced a further 15 charges for allegedly conspiring with Shankar and Ravindran, to submit quotations from MSE to the FAS, which dishonestly concealed the alleged facts that the works on the said MSE quotations would be carried out by ARN instead of MSE.
This alleged dishonesty induced FAS to award the said works to MSE, and deliver a sum amounting to $457,605 to MSE between 2016 and 2018.
Shankar has already been convicted and was slapped with a four-month jail term in November 2022.
Rikram is expected to be sentenced on 3 January 2024.
MAIN PHOTO: TMSG FILE