To be perfectly honest, I’ve no idea why this is a breaking news.
Could it be that Singapore has one more millionaire on the streets now?
Nevertheless, here’s what you should know: Kong Hee, the pastor who had been in the headlines from 2010 all the way to 2017, is now released from prison.
Back in April 2017, his original sentence of 8 years was reduced to 3 years and 6 months after his appeal. The pastor started his jail term soon after.
As inmates typically serve 2/3 of their sentences before being released on remission (unless you do something really silly in jail), the founder of City Harvest Church was released today after two years and four months of imprisonment.
During the remission period, the offender is not allowed (not that it’s allowed for anyone of us, anyways) to commit the offence again, or he or she would have to serve the remaining of the prison term plus the sentencing of the new offence.
Here’s a neat infographic done by the Singapore Prison Service that explains the system:
In other words, you can say that Kong Hee is now free, though he had lost the colour of his hair.
Yellow Ribbon for the Pastor?
Videos of him leaving prison with a wide smile have been circulating online today (22 August 2019):
While he hasn’t spoken to any reporters, City Harvest Church management has issued a message not to the media but to their “Church Family”, which shed some light on where Kong Hee is going to be.
According to the statement, Kong Hee had spent his time in prison “seeking and studying the things of God.”
In addition, he “will be taking a period to spend time with his family, especially his elderly parents.”
Also, the management has addressed him as a Pastor, so most probably he’d be back to the Church soon.
Lest you’ve forgotten what happened, here’s a brief recap.
Money Fly Here & There and Here & There
Basically, here’s what happened in a paragraph:
The leaders of CHC were charged for misappropriating about S$50 million of church funds for what is known as a “Crossover Project”, which seeks to evangelise (convert people to their faith) through Sun Ho’s singing career. The money was purportedly used to fund Sun Ho’s luxury lifestyle as a megastar. What’s worse is that the money wasn’t going through proper channels, but through a company that’s specifically started for this entire project.
For human beings like me who don’t know why it’s wrong, here’s why: those monies are donated cash, so they must be accounted for, and cannot be anyhowly used for anything, especially when it looks like there’s something to hide.
So far, Sun Ho has stopped her singing career.
In any case, this is considered a closed case and let’s hope people won’t anyhowly use donated money again.
If not your hair will turn white.
Here’s a simplified summary of the South Korea martial law that even a 5-year-old would understand:
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