According to statements of claim filed in the High Court, Shanmugam, who is coordinating minister for national security, and Tan, who is manpower minister, said parts of the article, titled “Singapore mansion deals are increasingly shrouded in secrecy”, were false, baseless and calculated to disparage and impugn them.
Bloomberg and the reporter who wrote the article, Low De Wei, have denied this through their lawyers. The trial is set to run from Tuesday to April 16.
On Tuesday morning, Shanmugam and Tan sat next to each other in court behind their team of lawyers led by senior counsel Davinder Singh.
Bloomberg and Low were represented by a team of lawyers led by senior counsels Sreenivasan Narayanan and Chelvan Retnam Rajah.
The article, published in December 2024, referred to non-caveated purchases of good-class bungalows in Singapore. A caveat refers to a legal document buyers submit to the Singapore Land Authority to register interest in a property.