singapore's political model has been described as a representative democracy, and singaporeans have constitutional rights to freedom of speech and assembly under articles 14(1)(a) and (b) of the constitution of the republic of singapore. the constitutional rights to free speech and assembly extend only to singapore citizens. hence, the singapore court of appeal has held that non-citizens enjoy only common law free speech. articles 14(1)(a) and (b) are then subject to articles 14(2)(a) and (b) which allow parliament to impose, by law, restrictions on the rights to freedom of speech and assembly. the grounds for restrictions are, for freedom of speech, singapore's security, friendly relations with other states, public order, public morality, protecting parliamentary privilege, defamation, contempt of court and incitement to any criminal offence; and for freedom of assembly, public order only. these restrictions made it a lengthy and difficult process to obtain the licence required to address a public gathering.