Appointment, Election, Selection Of New PM : Is It Constitutional?

 

Will there be a Vote of Confidence or not when Parliament reconvenes on September 6th 2021? 

If there is going to be a Vote of Confidence when Parliament re-convenes on September 6th, then what is the purpose of the MPs submitting their choice of Prime Minister to the YDP Agong by 4PM today?

Or is it being suggested that once the submission to the YDP Agong closes at 4PM today, Parliament cannot initiate any more Votes of Confidence? That will be un-Constitutional and also quite wrong.

Because what if the YDP Agong selects / appoints a PM (after the 4PM dead line today) and then on September 6th the Parliament elects someone else as the PM or casts a Vote of Confidence but still cannot choose a clear cut winner? 

Then what happens to the YDP Agong's selection process which closes by 4PM today?

Not only will it be at cross purposes but it can be a serious embarrasment for the Palace. 

And is it really Constitutional for the MPs to submit their choice for PM directly to the Palace instead of to the Parliament? Do keep reading.

Just now, the Malay Mail put out this story:

• KL Aug 18 — Agong meeting with Malay Rulers on August 20 to discuss next PM
• The Star today reported meeting scheduled at 2.30pm at Istana Negara on Friday
• Y'day, Dewan Rakyat Speaker issued notice: MPs submit choice for PM by 4pm 

My comments :

Again the question is 'Is this Constitutional?' 

Is it Constitutional to take the 'election' of a new Prime Minister out of the Parliamentary voting process and turn it into a "selection process"  by the Council of Rulers instead?

That is how I read it, because otherwise what is the purpose of the Council of Rulers even discussing this matter? 

Other than this suggestion being obviously completely unprecedented, where is the provision in the Federal Constitution to legally justify this course of action? 

I always thought our Federal Constitution is clear - it is Parliament and Parliament alone that decides which Member of Parliament has the majority support of the Dewan to form a Government. In other words "how" an MP becomes a Prime Minister. 

This is the domain of Parliament.  Once an MP has the majority support of the Dewan, his or her name is then presented to the YDP Agong, upon which the YDP Agong will then appoint that MP as the next Prime Minister.  

I am quite certain that somewhere in this process, where we already have a sitting Speaker of Parliament, the Speaker does send a written confirmation to the YDP Agong confirming the tally of MPs.  

The YDP Agong does not get directly involved in tallying the votes by the Members of Parliament to elect a new Prime Minister. 

That is best done through the Parliamentary process where the Speaker of the Parliament plays a purely clerical role in counting the votes and tallying the votes.  

More importantly it should be done inside Parliament when Parliament is in session.  By its very name "Dewan Rakyat", the Parliament represents the will of the people, determined through the voting process.  

The other question is if the MPs have to send their choices to the Palace, what are the safeguards for the counting of the votes? And is it Constitutional? 

Since the process obviously requires great confidentiality and yet must be transparent to scrutiny what are the Constitutional safeguards for such a process at the Palace? Remember the matter involves appointing a Prime Minister. 

On the other hand Parliament and the Speaker of Parliament are  bound by very well known and very strict rules of conduct on the manner of conducting, counting and tallying up the MP's votes in Parliament.  It is a well established process.  Parliament has a tried, tested and proven system to count the votes cast by MPs on any matter put before Parliament. 

Since Merdeka in 1957, our Parliament has approved thousands of Bills and Acts by counting the votes of the MPs inside Parliament.  For 63 years the Annual Budget has been approved by the vote count of the MPs inside  the Dewan. There have been no disputes of the voting inside Parliament.

This is the very essence of the Parliamentary process - whereby Parliament counts the votes cast by MPs to approve or oppose Bills, Acts and Laws.

And of course this must include the MPs voting for a Prime Minister.  It is just another count of votes which can be easily conducted by the Speaker through a simple counting process but inside Parliament. The Speaker need only know how to count up to 222, which is the number of MPs in Parliament (but two have died and there are only 220 left). 

Since we have a sitting Parliament and we have a Speaker, once the vote count has been determined in Parliament the results should be presented to the YDP Agong.

It is going to be quite difficult on the country to get yet another Prime Minister and yet another new government - the third (??) government in 39 months. 

It will take any new government a few months to get familiarised with manning all the Ministries. And then we are in the midst of this Covid pandemic. 

Can we afford to waste so much time ? 

Despite the slow start the Government is rolling out the Covid vaccination at some speed. We really need to get it up even faster. The fact is we are still some distance from achieving that 80% herd immunity. 

And the number of people turning up at the PPVs is perhaps slowing down. My 2nd dose was brought forward a little, meaning there are less people coming for vaccinations.

Which is good news if we have achieved 80% herd immunity. But we have not. So that is not so good news. 

That target of 100% adults vaccinated has to be achieved in double quick time. But there is no one in charge anymore - at the Ministerial level.

The Kleptocrats are very pleased with the present chaos and confusion. They think their cases will be magically dismissed in the Courts if a "friendlier" Prime Minister comes on board. Sarawak Report has spoken of lengthy meetings between the Kleptocrats and their party MPs.  They are obviously trying their level best to influence the outcomes.  They are very desperate.  

I think they are in for a shock.  Lets wait and see.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.