SUPPORT MAHATHIR – BUT DON’T GIVE HIM & DAIM A FREE HAND: HARAPAN LEADERS MUST HAVE THE GUTS TO ASK PM TO FORMALISE TERMS FOR EXTENSION OF CEP

On Thursday, Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said the term of the Council of Eminent Persons (CEP) could very well extend beyond the current government’s first 100 days in office.

Speaking to reporters, he said, “I haven’t decided. I never said it is 100 days… no, I still need their services.”

First, let us call a spade a spade: Mahathir had, in fact, stated on May 12 that the term of the council would be 100 days.

“This council will only be around for 100 days,” he said at a press conference after chairing Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) presidential council meeting.

Mahathir’s statement at the time was also in line with the press release issued, which read: “The team will assist in shaping up policies and programmes to achieve the 100-day promises that PH made to the people. Thus the lifespan of this team will be 100 days.”

Given the above, Mahathir, let’s not mince words: the truth of the matter is, you did announce a timeframe for the council. To today claim otherwise is at best a failure of memory, and at worst, a bald-faced lie.

Neither is particularly becoming, especially as Malaysians have entrusted you, along with your esteemed colleagues in PH, to chart a new path forward for the country. To take on such a task – and discharge it well – requires as much eminence and prior expertise as it does a sense of responsibility and accountability. In the era of resurgent, demagogic and unbecoming leadership across many nations, vigilance and transparency remain the antidotes to such mockery of the people’s rights, and their intelligence. See also the prior government’s tactics, which the current government is always eager to put itself in contrast to.

Having dispensed with the factual record, let me state categorically: I have little interest in questioning the possibility of prerogative of the prime minister. As a student of politics, I remind myself that until and only if an exercise of prerogative is detrimental to the needs and requirements of society (itself adjudged by the polity), the day-to-day happenings in society often make it tough to claim what is and and is not a rightful use of prerogative. One might look to the prior government’s fate, and the allegations of corruption surrounding this, as only the most recent example of when prerogative, on its own, is revealed to be less than carte blanche.

I also acknowledge that compared to other arrangements, at least we have the formal construct of a council rather than unnamed and shadowy advisers to the prime minister that are otherwise unknown to the Malaysian public.

All the same: we know that prerogative, even for the head of state, is not infinite and must instead be exercised in dialogue with other norms and principles. This is the great finding of political theorists and practitioners throughout the ages – we cannot whitewash this truth; most certainly not at this critical time in our country’s political re-awakening. The contextually-sensitive exercise of raw power and prerogative is precisely what separates the good leaders from the great; what separates the ones who think beyond their individual tenure from those who attach their actions to the very eminent (pun only partially intended) concerns of a nation.

The record to date shows we have been met with a hodgepodge of explanations as to the council’s role: a vacuous initial press statement and a smattering of replies and commentaries from esteemed ministers and members of Parliament. Yet we still lack canonical terms of reference or a similar document that sets out, for the record and for all to see, the remit and limits of the council, much less however long the body intends to remain constituted.

Such practice is far from professional, and instead suggests a mockery of good, responsible governance. The Malaysians of 2018 are owed respect, through clarity of actions, not obfuscation. The people deserve to know the limits of the council’s authority and the manner in which members of the council are to conduct their business, regardless of how important and esteemed their prior or current positions and service to society are. The concern is all the more pressing in the light of the prior governance failings and inconsistencies that today’s government continues to have no issue dredging up and deploying in the absence of firmer political capital. If ever there was a case of the pot calling the kettle black, it is now.

With all of the above in mind, I call on Mahathir, the council, and those in a position to speak wise counsel to both, to formalise this institution of the council, including its temporal limitations, so as to preserve and re-affirm the importance of rule of law, amid what all of us will readily acknowledge is a monumental transition for our beloved nation – and to do so for the generations to come, which we are always laying the groundwork for.

Whether you see fit to decide this by decree or subject it to parliamentary oversight, at the very least, hold the actions of the council accountable to something more tangible and fleshed-out than has been the case to date.

In closing, I offer some thoughts to address the expected critiques of this propose recommendation to codify the council’s terms:

Some will argue that my concerns are pedantic. They will argue that to focus on codification would rob the council and its supporters of time spent getting on with its work. If you are in this camp, I put it to you: what concerns you so much about putting pen to paper and formalising – if not institutionalising – a body that, to date, has operated in the proverbial twilight zone?

If your defence is mere expediency, I ask this: in three months’ time, much less a few days, should the Malaysian public really believe there has been no time to take such action? For a council that considers issues as weighty as they do, in the name and interest of the people, their roles deserve to be filled in.

They need not be hollowed out, but they are not owed carte blanche, which as discussed above, simply is not becoming of our nascent, if ever-persistent, democracy. In the absence of anarchy, a republic constructs rules and, in turn, expectations; all the more so when policymakers have the requisite space and time to do so amid the nation’s urgent plans.

It is well to believe this is not a concern when times are good – but as James Madison reminded a once-nascent democracy elsewhere, “[W]hat is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.”

Eminent persons they may be; angels they are not, however, just like you and I. Accordingly, such “auxiliary” precautions, the least of which may be codifying the council’s terms of reference, are simply the responsible thing to do. If the council and Mahathir take such an affirmative step, it will hardly be looked upon unfavourably, even if it is not the path most easily taken. The good times are an opportunity to strengthen adherence to rule of law and institutions; do not take them for granted.

Still others will contend that were anything formalised regarding the council’s duties, it would prove problematic if somehow necessary to contravene – that the uniqueness of this watershed moment in Malaysian politics dictates that we cannot know ahead of time what duties the council may need to perform. To then circumscribe their remit, through a terms of reference or similar formal document, may create unnecessary future headaches.

To this, I say simply: let not the perfect be the enemy of the good. Choose to operate in a realm of accountability, over one that is beyond reproach. The latter is not always a slippery slope, but the logic of prerogative is an insufficient mechanism to explain and justify it. Operate instead on the principle that it is always the right time to claim the mantle of accountability and professionalism – and frankly, responsibility. At worst, if such action is taken and there remain those who take issue with your practice (which there certainly will be!), at least then you can argue on the basis of a written principle, which is not the case now.

And finally, there are those who will trot out the familiar trope that politics, and politicians, are both well-known and much maligned for: hypocrisy. Having seen the effectual truth of this, I acknowledge hypocrisy’s persistence through time, and that some view it as the ultimate weapon in the politician’s toolbox.

But as many much more eminent leaders and speakers have reminded us over the years, we must not fall into the lazy belief that the current state of affairs provides an excuse for what could be: we must strive for better, in much the same way the aspirations of many millions of Malaysians spoke resoundingly at the ballot box on May 9.

Build upon, rather than cut down in the name of expediency, the principles of accountability and professionalism. With luck, we will lay better groundwork for our political culture than some would say had been laid out in the decades preceding.

And thus, to the PH leaders, I say unequivocally:

Thank you for your service to date, which is by many measures proving a test of your ideals and desires for our nation.

You may not be able to accomplish everything in your manifesto, much less the promises for the first 100 days, but please do not sacrifice accountability and professionalism in the process. Those watching expect better of you, and we hope that you can continue to rise to the occasion.

– FMT