SINGAPORE — The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has rejected an application by States Times Review (STR) founder Alex Tan to cancel a correction direction issued to him last year.

In a press statement on Friday (Jan 3), the MHA said that STR’s application, which was sent on Wednesday, simply restated false statements and provided no evidence to disprove the grounds on which the correction direction was issued.

“After having carefully considered the application, the Minister for Home Affairs has decided to reject it,” read the statement. “Alex Tan has been notified of the rejection.”

On Nov 23 last year, the STR published a post which alleged, among other things, that the People’s Action Party (PAP) will be fielding a Christian evangelist in the upcoming General Election to win Christian votes.

The post went on to claim that the “whistleblower” who had exposed the PAP candidate’s Christian affiliations had been arrested and faced police charges for fabricating fake news.

The post also said that the NUSSU – NUS Students United Facebook page, which had carried a post about this supposed candidate, had been taken down and that the owner of the page was under police investigation after Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam ordered the arrest.

The MHA said on Friday that it had refuted the falsehoods in its statement on Nov 28 last year.

“No one has been arrested or charged arising from the NUSSU – NUS Students United post. The Government did not request that Facebook take down the NUSSU – NUS Students United post or disable the page,” said the MHA in its statement last year.

A correction direction was issued to Mr Tan then, which required him to insert a correction notice stating that the STR Facebook post contained false statements of fact.

“To date, Alex Tan has not complied with the correction direction,” said the MHA on Friday.

Following Mr Tan’s non-compliance, the MHA instructed the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (Pofma) office to issue a targeted correction direction to Facebook on Nov 29.

It was the first time that the Government had issued an order to an internet intermediary under the fake-news laws.

In a previous report by TODAY, the MHA said that this was not the first time that STR, as well as two other websites run by Mr Tan — Temasek Review News and Singapore Herald — have “perpetuated outright fabrications, such as misrepresenting Singapore’s position in foreign relations with other countries and casting aspersions on the integrity of public institutions”.