SINGAPORE - The Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) has apologised to the agency running Megan Khung’s pre-school for the misunderstanding over “finger-pointing” in its initial reponse in April on the girl’s case, Minister-in-Charge of Social Services Integration Desmond Lee said on Nov 5.

Mr Lee was responding to a supplementary question in Parliament by Mr Cai Yinzhou (Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC) concerning the case of four-year-old Megan Khung.

Mr Cai said that earlier reports of MSF’s statement in April seemed to pin blame on Beyond Social Services (BSS), the agency that runs Megan’s pre-school.

Mr Lee said there is a balance between setting out the facts of what happened and keeping the social service sector cohesive.

“The aim is to reflect on what happened and see how those gaps should be closed. And so there was not and should not be an intention to point fingers,” he said.

“At the same time, the public expects some accountability and the laying out of the facts. That is what happened with the report of the independent panel, and we’ve read the report and seen what happened.”

“And so, to the extent that there was a misunderstanding that there was finger-pointing, we have apologised to the relevant agencies, including Beyond Social Services, for the misunderstanding that had occurred. It was not the intention, but if that was perceived, we have apologised as well,” he added.

MSF had earlier said in April that BSS’ report did not fully describe the severity of the injuries and gave no reason for the Early Childhood Development Agency to suspect her abuse. The ministry also said BSS did not escalate the case to CPS.

A report by an independent review panel in October later found that BSS had called CPS, but the CPS officer did not register the call in its logs.

Four-year-old Megan died in Feb 2020 after months of physical and emotional abuse by her mother and her mother’s boyfriend. A rev...