BROMPTON BIKE SAGA: NPARKS ASSISTANT DIRECTOR CHARGED

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More than a year after the controversial purchase of Brompton Bikes by NParks, Bernard Lim Yong Soon, the assistant director of NParks, has been charged with providing false information to government officials about the deal.

Lim had told the MND that he had no personal relationship with the director of BikeHope, the company which won the tender for the sale of 26 foldable bikes.

In fact, this information was found to be false and he had a personal friendship with Lawrence Lim Chun How, the director of Bikehop.

Bernard was also charged with abetting Lawrence Lim to lie to MND officials about their relationship during an internal audit.

The case of the controversial tender was first uncovered by some netizens who noticed that NParks had purchased 26 Brompton foldable bikes at a cost of $2,200 each.

There were allegations that NParks had not followed the proper tender process as the tender was only open for a short time and was awarded to BikeHop in the absence of any other offers.

It was later found in an MND audit that the tender process was followed correctly, but admitting some flaws in the system, the government promised to look over the process of the award of tenders when only 1 quote is received.

When the sale was first uncovered last year, netizens went to dig more on the case to do their own investigatons into the tender. Photos were found of NParks directors with the owners of BikeHop at several biking events and netizens then drew the conclusion that something was a miss.

It's curious that officials have taken more than a year to acknowlegde the same facts.

During the intial investigation, Lim was suspended and referred to the CPIB last year in July. A court will hear his case again on the 27th September this year.

If found guilty of providing false information to government officials, Lim could face up to 1 year in jail, a find of no more than $5000 or both.
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