SINGAPORE - The first of two SMRT shareholder meetings on Thursday (Sep 29) ended with 98.84 per cent voting in support of selling its rail assets to the government as part of the New Rail Financing Framework (NRFF) deal.

Thousands of shareholders and proxies attended the extraordinary general meeting, which started at around 2.30pm.

The question-and-answer session was lively, with many voicing concerns and uncertainty over Temasek Holding's buyout offer, even though that matter was to be voted in a different, subsequent meeting.

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As a result, voting did not start until 4.15pm, only to be disrupted by technical issues. The final result came in at around 4.35pm, after several restarts.

The NRFF will see the government take over SMRT's train assets, allowing the operator to focus on providing and hopefully improving services.