Having served 5 years as the Speaker of the Selangor State Legislative Assembly, I thought I had the mental capacity to sit through the motions in Parliament yesterday concerning the removal of the Speaker and his Deputy Speaker but I was wrong. After the adjournment yesterday, I came home and crashed because of the toll it took on me, having to sit through an unprecedented disastrous transition of power for the head of the highest law-making institution in this land.
Amongst the reasons for the uproar over the tragic proceedings:
(1) a motion to remove the Speaker (in the absence of wrongdoing) and such a motion is not supported with any reason;
(2) this motion was rushed through with only 10 minutes given to each of the 2 Opposition spokesman;
(3) upon the removal of the Speaker, the Opposition members were not given an opportunity to nominate a candidate for the new Speaker; and
(4) the new Speaker was installed without a vote being taken.
The Hansard record will show that throughout the entire process, there was minimal input by the Prime Minister (apart from reading his own motion, he subcontracted it to the Law Minister to answer the Opposition), the muzzled 4 senior Ministers representing UMNO, GPS and Bersatu, Wee Ka Siong (MCA) and Saravanan Murugan (MIC) who sat and watched in silence and not a single word uttered by Najib Razak, Hadi Awang, and Zahid Hamidi while they watched democracy and impartiality of the House being usurped by the Executive. Instead, they unleashed their loud GLC-position hoarders doubling as backbenchers to taunt and mock our Opposition lawmakers who were trying to speak, hurling uncouth and disrespectful comments at almost everyone in the Opposition bench including the former Prime Minister, Tun Dr Mahathir.
The silver lining for me was seeing something I only knew in theory, which sealed the hope and assurance that what is needed to take on and challenge this awful PN government is a combined force of Anwar, Shafie, and Mahathir. They were united in one common purpose yesterday and spoke against the removal of the Speaker and the importance of following due process in Parliament. In taking on the loud taunts and jeers by the opponents today, they spoke in measured calmness and defended the importance of an independent Speaker and a Parliament that is beyond reproach. It was evident they emerged from the loud chaos as respected statesmen over Malaysia.
As a DAP Parliamentarian, I emerge from the proceedings of this infamous sitting knowing that all 3 statesmen are on the same bloc, and they are on my side, our side, the people’s side to complete the work started in 2018 to reform Malaysia. It is evident for the world to see and more importantly, for Malaysians to watch the proceedings of this August House and distinguish the statesmen from the pretenders.
Hannah Yeoh
Member of Parliament for Segambut
Media Statement dated 14 July 2020
