Ng Boon Gay's lawyer Tan Chee Meng devoted a substantial part of his submissions on Friday to poking holes in the four charges his client is accused of.

CHARGE 1: Oral sex from Ms Cecilia Sue in July last year when she was a sales manager at Hitachi Data Systems (HDS)

Mr Tan said: The prosecution does not dispute that Ng did not influence the work of his subordinates, or give directions to them to favour any specific group, when the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) awarded a $320,619 contract to Jardine OneSolution - with HDS a sub-vendor - in November last year.

If the sex received by Ng was an inducement to further HDS' business interests, one would expect him to exercise favour for this project. The prosecution has also accepted that this tender was not "tainted" with corruption.

CHARGE 2: Oral sex in November last year, in exchange for furthering HDS' business interest

Mr Tan: This is entirely contradicted by undisputed evidence.

Ms Sue had already tendered her resignation to HDS in October. By late October and November, she was already trying to further the interests of her new employer, Oracle Corp Singapore.

CHARGES 3 & 4, relating to furthering Oracle's business interests: Oral sex obtained on Dec 2 and Dec 9 last year, a month after she had joined Oracle

Mr Tan: Oracle Corporation Singapore managing director Leslie Ong told the court that there was no business relationship between the company and CNB at the time. This was the case for the next three years as well.

Mr Ong had said that based on forecasts, the firm was "not looking at any business with CNB pertaining to Ms Sue".

Mr Tan says the prosecution must prove there were business interests of Oracle with CNB that Ng could show favour to at the material time. But it failed to prove this essential element of the charge.

Mr Tan made another point: The only common thread in Ms Sue's testimony and statements to the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau was that she would never give sex in exchange for contracts.

LEONARD LIM