Limits to Hasni’s salutary aspirations

 

From Terence Netto

Barisan Nasional’s menteri besar-designate for Johor is an earnest politician.

You would want to believe him when he says he wants a racially balanced government should BN win the state polls.

Hasni Mohammad noted that the government he led before the state assembly was dissolved on Jan 22 had been racially lopsided.

He said it consisted chiefly of Malay elected representatives while the opposition comprised mainly non-Malays. He proposed to rectify the imbalance should BN come through with a comfortable majority in the polls.

He is to be applauded for saying he would be more comfortable as a leader if his government reflected the ethnic balance of the population.

He is concerned with equity, not only in developmental allocations for government and oppositions reps (he wants all assemblymen to get equal amounts); he also wants stark malapportionment in the electorates pared away such that they adhere to the one person one vote principle.

Hasni said if BN gained a two-thirds majority in the state assembly, his government would seek redelineation of constituencies such that one vote in a sparsely populated rural ward in Johor would not be worth as many as three in a densely populated urban seat.

In other words, the malapportionment would be pared away to reflect the principle of universal suffrage, that is, one person one vote.

More equity in the ethnic balance in government and in the balance between votes in rural and urban seats would make a Hasni government adherent to the better canons of good governance.

However, in Johor such norms would not be enough to ensure good governance, given a civil service that is overwhelmingly composed of one ethnicity.

The Johor civil service is a key player in the provision of good governance in the state.

In January 2021, more than three score officers of the service were either promoted or reassigned in an exercise conducted by the state secretary that was a fait accompli by the time Hasni knew about it.

It must have been a chastening experience for the chief executive of the state to know that he had little to no influence on the matter.

Should he be the Johor menteri besar again, how Hasni copes with the circumscriptions to his authority will determine whether his strivings for equity in critical aspects of his government will have a positive impact, overall. - FMT

Terence Netto is a senior journalist and an FMT reader.

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