Only fair for Anwar to be made next PM, says Zaid

 

Former de facto law minister Zaid Ibrahim said the current government had openly lied to and misled Parliament.

PETALING JAYA: It is only fair that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong invite opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim to form a new government, former minister Zaid Ibrahim said.

“This is what most democracies ala Westminster style will do,” the former de facto law minister said in a statement today.

Citing his sources, he said 12 Umno MPs had already given their support to Anwar.

This was despite deputy prime minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob insisting that 40 BN MPs were supporting Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin.

He added that the King could appoint almost anyone to be the next prime minister so long as he was satisfied that he had the support of the majority of the MPs.

Zaid said the new prime minister would have majority support as the current government had conducted “a serious infraction” by openly lying and misleading Parliament on the revocation of the emergency ordinances.

“He (the new PM) will be strongly supported. Even if the King appoints a particular candidate as prime minister with support of 100 MPs at noon, the new prime minister will get 120 by 5pm on the same day.

“That’s how things are in our country.”

He said Muhyiddin’s office had suggested that the Malay Rulers were “puppets” who had to follow every Cabinet decision when he defied the King’s statement on Thursday.

“Even (former prime minister) Dr Mahathir Mohamad, when confronting the Rulers on the issue of immunity in 1993, did not humiliate them when presenting the government’s views.

“Dr Mahathir, who at the time helmed a strong BN government with a two-thirds majority, never made assertions to suggest that the Malay Rulers were ‘puppets’ who had to follow whatever the Cabinet had decided without question.”

Zaid said the King had no option but to appoint a new prime minister now that Muhyiddin was unlikely to enjoy the confidence of the monarch and the rakyat.

The King said on Thursday he had not consented to the revocation of the emergency ordinances, announced by de facto law minister Takiyuddin Hassan in Parliament on July 26.

In his rebuttal, the Prime Minister’s Office said the decision was made in accordance with the law, adding that the government had held a virtual audience with the King on July 24, attended by Takiyuddin and Attorney-General Idrus Harun, during which they informed him of their decision. - FMT