SINGAPORE: City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee
engaged in "a series of lies and deceptions" over the years in order to
"conceal and facilitate" the misuse of monies from the church's Building
Fund, charged the prosecution as it wrapped up its cross-examination on
Tuesday (Sep 9).
These monies were allegedly used to buy sham bonds in two church-linked companies - Xtron Productions and Firna - to finance the church's Crossover Project, which was the church's way of evangelising through secular pop music, and fronted by Kong's wife Sun Ho.
While on the stand, Kong maintained that he relied heavily on a verbal personal guarantee given by Indonesian businessman and church member Wahju Hanafi in 2002, in which the latter promised to underwrite all expenses from the project.
But the prosecution alleged that this was just one area where Kong had consistently lied, and that there was no such a promise, as Mr Hanafi's supposed personal guarantee was only signed in 2010. It was also backdated to 2007 - before the Xtron bonds were drawn down.
The prosecution accused Kong and his deputies of using Mr Hanafi and his alleged "personal guarantee" as a conduit for funds - that had been taken out to fund the Crossover Project - to be returned to the church.
Kong and several of his deputies, such as Deputy Senior Pastor Tan Ye Peng, and the church's former investment manager Chew Eng Han, had also signed a guarantee pledging to help Mr Hanafi out if he ran into financial difficulties.
Kong said he agreed to sign the "back-to-back" guarantee as the Crossover Project was also part of the church's mission. "What was told to me at the material time was that Wahju is going to make good the album expenses, we are all in the same family, we are all brothers together," he said. "Should we all just encourage him to let him know that we are standing together with him, and if need be we will also provide financial support? And with that, I say 'yes'."
The prosecution refuted this, charging that Kong and his deputies had signed the guarantee as Mr Hanafi needed the security of knowing he would not be saddled with any debts, since he was simply allowing his name to be used as a guarantor for the Crossover Project.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Christopher Ong also pointed out that Kong and his deputies knew Mr Hanafi did not have the means to make good on the personal guarantee at the time he signed it, and that they had "scrambled" to source loans to meet the payment so as to "create the semblance that Wahju was making good on his guarantee".
Kong denied that the sourcing of funds was intended to create such an impression. "Wahju was willing to take a loan to be liable. Others were lending money to him, and he was liable for those loans as well. But we wanted to help, and we, too, were helping him to get the loans so that he could make good his guarantee to make up for the album expense." he told the court.
These monies were allegedly used to buy sham bonds in two church-linked companies - Xtron Productions and Firna - to finance the church's Crossover Project, which was the church's way of evangelising through secular pop music, and fronted by Kong's wife Sun Ho.
While on the stand, Kong maintained that he relied heavily on a verbal personal guarantee given by Indonesian businessman and church member Wahju Hanafi in 2002, in which the latter promised to underwrite all expenses from the project.
But the prosecution alleged that this was just one area where Kong had consistently lied, and that there was no such a promise, as Mr Hanafi's supposed personal guarantee was only signed in 2010. It was also backdated to 2007 - before the Xtron bonds were drawn down.
The prosecution accused Kong and his deputies of using Mr Hanafi and his alleged "personal guarantee" as a conduit for funds - that had been taken out to fund the Crossover Project - to be returned to the church.
Kong and several of his deputies, such as Deputy Senior Pastor Tan Ye Peng, and the church's former investment manager Chew Eng Han, had also signed a guarantee pledging to help Mr Hanafi out if he ran into financial difficulties.
Kong said he agreed to sign the "back-to-back" guarantee as the Crossover Project was also part of the church's mission. "What was told to me at the material time was that Wahju is going to make good the album expenses, we are all in the same family, we are all brothers together," he said. "Should we all just encourage him to let him know that we are standing together with him, and if need be we will also provide financial support? And with that, I say 'yes'."
The prosecution refuted this, charging that Kong and his deputies had signed the guarantee as Mr Hanafi needed the security of knowing he would not be saddled with any debts, since he was simply allowing his name to be used as a guarantor for the Crossover Project.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Christopher Ong also pointed out that Kong and his deputies knew Mr Hanafi did not have the means to make good on the personal guarantee at the time he signed it, and that they had "scrambled" to source loans to meet the payment so as to "create the semblance that Wahju was making good on his guarantee".
Kong denied that the sourcing of funds was intended to create such an impression. "Wahju was willing to take a loan to be liable. Others were lending money to him, and he was liable for those loans as well. But we wanted to help, and we, too, were helping him to get the loans so that he could make good his guarantee to make up for the album expense." he told the court.
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