SingPost’s board says decision to sack 3 top executives was ‘carefully considered’, releases detailed timeline

PHASE TWO

The company then looked at management’s conduct in the handling of investigations into the whistleblowing reports.

They were not directly involved in the allegations raised in the whistleblowing reports.

SingPost also looked at the renewal of the affected customer agreement in 2023.

“The key issue here centred around governance expectations and proper conduct by management. The same external law firm was also engaged to review management’s conduct in the matter,” said the company.

In the course of these investigations it was found that although Mr Phang, Mr Yik and Mr Li were provided with the reports and finds of, as well as concerns raised by GIA, they made “serious misrepresentations” about the allegations.

This was despite “clear evidence” substantiating the allegations.

These false assertions include that there was “no evidence of data manipulation and wrongdoing” in relation to the manual data entries.

They also claimed there was no evidence of falsification to avoid paying penalties, and that the manual data entries were not to avoid such penalties.

SingPost said the top executives asserted that the practice of manual data entries “would not attract any liabilities” and that it was requested by the customer.

It was claimed that the customer was “fully aware” of the assumptions of manual data entries and that such practice was in line with industry practice.

“These misrepresentations, made over three occasions from Mar 11 to Apr 3 contradicted the findings in GIA’s reports and were without any independent evidence or substantiation,” said the company, adding that all three were expected to protect the interests of the company at all times.

However, instead of addressing the findings, they relied on the misrepresentations made by representatives from IBU Ops, who were interest parties.

“The misrepresentations by Mr Phang, Mr Yik and Mr Li effectively undermined GIA, an independent and important group function responsible for investigating whistleblower incidents,” said SingPost.

“The board notes that if the audit committee had relied on and accepted the misrepresentations by Mr Phang, Mr Yik and Mr Li over GIA’s findings, the practice of the false manual ‘DF’ data entries which were intended to avoid contractual penalties would likely have continued.”

After investigations and further deliberations by the board, as well as consulting external legal counsel, SingPost opened disciplinary proceedings against all three.