The Prime Minister Should Not Precipitate A Constitutional Crisis By Subverting The Royal Decree From The King And State Rulers To Convene Parliament As Soon As Possible Through Delays And Meaningless Professions Of “Taken Note”.

Prime Minister Mahiaddin Md Yasin should not precipitate a constitutional crisis by subverting the royal decree from the King and State Rulers to convene Parliament as soon as possible, through delays and meaningless professions of “taken note”. Responding to the royal decree through the Prime Minister Office(PMO) is unusual, when it is normal for the Prime Minister to reply personally to such an important pronouncement.

Neither was there any clarity when Parliament will be allowed to convene to fulfil the required condition of the King to convene “as soon as possible”.

Is it three or four months later in September or October, as stated by the Prime Minister before the Royal decree and repeated by de facto Law Minister Takiyuddin Hassan yesterday?

Malaysians had expected the Prime Minister to demonstrate his loyalty to the Royal decree by immediately implementing the King’s wish for Parliament to be reconvened as soon as possible. The King wants to see MPs perform their elected role to debate the National Recovery Plan(NRP), the financial aid needed to mitigate the economic suffering of the rakyat losing their jobs, businesses and economic livelihoods, National Immunisation Programme and the country’s Covid-19 response.

Similarly, the Prime Minister should give effect to the wishes of the State Rulers that the state of emergency should not be extended beyond the scheduled August 1 expiry date and that Putrajaya permit both Parliament and State Assemblies to be reconvened. All three PH state governments in Penang, Selangor and Negeri Sembilan have publicly declared their readiness to comply with the Royal decree to hold state assembly meetings as soon as possible.

UMNO state governments are expected to follow suit. Only the PAS state governments adopt an ostrich in the sand approach by pretending that nothing is happening.

Parliament is suspended through the exercise of emergency powers issued in the name of the King. If the King wishes for Parliament to be convened and the Prime Minister refuses to give effect to this, then this disputes the legality and legitimacy of the exercise of this emergency power suspending Parliament.

For the Prime Minister to refuse to comply with the wishes of the King to revoke the suspension of Parliament that is issued under the King’s name, is analogous to the Prime Minister illegally using his glamour name Muhyiddin Yassin instead of his real name Mahiaddin Md Yasin. Further, Parliament complies with the 3 criteria for reopening under the NRP.

Mahiaddin had announced that Parliament is scheduled to reopen only if the new daily Covid-19 case count falls below 2,000 and the vaccination rate has reached 40 percent, “sufficient” beds at Intensive Care Units (ICU) available to Covid-19 patients. There are zero daily COVID-19 cases involving MPs, no MPs are receiving treatment under ICU and all MPs are fully vaccinated. Mahiaddin has no rationale or excuse not to reopen Parliament.

Lim Guan Eng

DAP Secretary General