City Harvest trial: Kong accused of sweeping dirt under the carpet (InSing: 9th Sept 2014)

When City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee and his church leaders realised that the authorities were on their trail, they allegedly tried to do a cover-up and eliminated links between the church and Xtron, the management company responsible for promoting the music career of Kong’s singer-wife Ho Yeow Sun.

This was the charge raised by the prosecution in court when the trial continued on Monday 8 September, Channel NewsAsia reported.

Kong and five church leaders are accused of misusing more than S$50 million in church funds to finance Ho’s music career.

The prosecution argued that the church leaders did that to avoid questioning from the authorities, but Kong said in defence that he did that to avoid misconceptions because speculation was going rife online that church leaders were benefiting from church-goers’ donations.

Apparently, a blogger identified as John Lim “was insinuating that church funds were being siphoned into Xtron, and somehow we were benefiting from it, or there was some corruption involved", the news channel reported Kong as saying.

This happened in 2010, after the church acquired a stake in Suntec Convention Centre.

Kong said there was a need for the church and Xtron to begin on a "clean slate", adding that one way to do so was to clear up expenses Xtron incurred from the music ventures, and Xtron would also have to repay advance rental fees it received from the church.

MONEY GUARANTEED

Kong had turned to Indonesian businessman Wahju Hanafi, who is a longtime member of the church, saying that he had personally guaranteed to cover Ho’s album costs totalling some S$30 million.

Kong said the sum promised was needed if the advance rental fees were to be repaid and that they would repay Wahju partially in time.

The prosecution then questioned why there was the intention to return part of the money if Wahju had made the guarantee.

Kong replied after some exchange in court that the businessman had his other commitments, and while "Wahju was willing to make good his guarantee to support us, or support the album cost, at the same time we wanted to help because this is also our mission".

Deputy Public Prosecutor Christopher Ong did not buy the response. The news channel quoted him as saying: “The reason why you (Kong Hee) were trying to sweep the transactions with Xtron under the carpet is because that's what you do if your house is dirty and a visitor might be turning up unexpectedly.”