Very good article in The Star regarding corporate governance issues regarding a "government-linked logistics and e-commerce group".

We can safely assume that the company in question is non other than SGX listed SingPost.

The article centers around important issues like conflict of interest, independence of directors, “box-ticking corporate governance approach” and the important role of "public outrage".

The special audit report regarding the matter can be found here.

On one side, there is quite a lot of useful information to be found in this report about the process regarding the three acquisitions.

On the other side I think important details have been left out. For instance, a broad background of the three companies could have been given (some key numbers before and after the acquisition of each company plus the price for which they were acquired). The companies were acquired one, two and three years ago, so it would be interesting to know how they have performed since their acquisition.

Also, the money that Tay and his company earned through the transactions would have given more context: was it a tiny amount, or were millions of S$ involved?

And why did the three companies hire Tay's company as advisor, surely there must be hundreds of this kind of financial arrangers/advisors, was it mere coincidence?

It appears that the terms of reference for the special audit were too narrow to provide this kind of information, missing out on an opportunity to clear the air once and for all.