Why Saifuddin is unfit to be home minister

Sometime this month in Parliament, Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail is going to present constitutional amendments to misguidedly make it tougher - much tougher - for poor, underprivileged, stateless people to become citizens.

Our government leaders talk about oppression in other countries but consistently fail to look in our own backyards. The proposed new amendments make it very difficult for the stateless to find a home and potentially could involve hundreds of thousands of people.

So far, he has done nothing about other major amendments proposed for decades by PKR, the not-so-dominant dominant party in the ruling coalition government, of which he is incidentally a member, and which has been in PKR’s manifesto for several elections.

These would have rolled back draconian provisions in the law that have been used in the past to detain opposition leaders, jail and oppress politicians and NGO leaders, and stop free and fair discussion.

They include changes to or repeal of the Printing Presses and Publications Act (PPPA), which gives draconian powers to the government to shut down newspapers at any time, and provisions in the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Act which allow sites to be blocked and/or shut down.

Others include the draconian ISA replacement, the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act or Sosma, the Sedition Act, the Official Secrets Act, and a multitude of archaic and oppressive provisions under the Penal Code.

It definitely looks like Umno rules the roost, not PKR. Saifuddin is not helping. Confoundingly, he said the PPPA will not be amended and talks about strengthening Sosma instead. That’s an old Umno refrain.

Saifuddin is a back-door home minister. He lost his MP post in the November 2022 elections. Earlier in May that year, he lost the race for deputy president of PKR to Rafizi Ramli, who won emphatically. He enjoys neither the support of his party nor his electorate.

Still, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, in his wisdom or lack of it, appointed him home minister through the backdoor by getting him in as a senator, a dubious distinction he shares with that other losing MP, Umno’s senator and Investment, Trade and Industry Minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz. Earlier, he was appointed secretary-general of PKR by Anwar.

‘Manufacturing’ statelessness

The Malaysian Bar, many civil society groups, and some government backbenchers have heavily criticised the constitutional amendments. The following points were highlighted by the Malaysian Bar.

• Amending Section 19B of the Second Schedule, Part III of the Federal Constitution to alter citizenship by “operation of law” to citizenship by “registration”, which will result in foundlings (abandoned children) being deprived of automatic citizenship.

The term “operation of law” gives protection to foundlings as this provision grants them the benefit of the doubt in cases where the date and place of their birth, as well as the identity of their biological parents, are unknown and cannot be substantiated, the Malaysian Bar explains.

The suggested amendment seeks to place foundlings under the discretionary authority of the home minister.  

• Amending Section 1(a) of the Second Schedule, Part II of the Federal Constitution to delete the words “permanently resident”, which would result in children born to Malaysian permanent residents (PR), becoming stateless, as they no longer have access to citizenship by “operation of law”.

In effect, vulnerable populations - including current stateless communities like the “childhood statelessness” category, Orang Asli, and Orang Asal - could also face the peril of being ensnared in the cycle of statelessness across generations.

• Amending Article 26(2) of the Federal Constitution to replace “date of the marriage” with “date of obtaining citizenship” may lead to citizenship deprivation of foreign wives, because if a Malaysian man’s marriage dissolves within two years of his wife being granted Malaysian citizenship, the foreign spouse’s citizenship will be revoked.

• Amending Article 15(A) of the Federal Constitution to reduce the age limit from “twenty-one years” to “eighteen years” for citizenship registration effectively shortens the time frame for applications.

Malaysian Bar president Karen Cheah said: “The main source of the problem is the bureaucratic delays and appeals, which could take years to process citizenship applications that subsist, as well as introduce an illegitimate registration requirement that never existed previously.

“It would appear that the cabinet’s approval of these amendments is an antithesis to the citizenship provisions in the Federal Constitution, which were meant to prevent, not manufacture, statelessness.

“In analysing these proposed regressive amendments, it is apparent that they are designed to allow the National Registration Department (NRD) to impose discretionary citizenship processes in addition to the existing bureaucratic hurdles faced by stateless persons.”

That’s a terrible indictment against the proposed constitutional amendments from which the only positive impact seems to be allowing Malaysian mothers equal rights to register their children overseas for citizenship.

A lose-lose situation

Saifuddin, in the meantime, has been oblivious to these complaints and continues on his course to push the amendments through and is actively canvassing support for it from MPs.

Why such legislation is so important for him, when those PKR promised in its manifesto which is far more significant and doesn’t even require a constitutional amendment lay by the wayside, is a mystery only he can answer.

The amendment is going to raise hackles among many PKR, DAP, Sarawakian, and Sabah MPs but might find some support from PAS and Bersatu, whom Saifuddin seems to be rather eager to please. Why go for such changes that are going to divide PKR and weaken it further?

Meanwhile, the NRD is notorious for its slow action when it comes to citizenship issues, making it needlessly hard for legitimate cases to be given citizenship instead of facilitating it.

It is a serious problem - in 2016, then home minister and now deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said in Parliament that there were nearly 300,000 stateless children. Saifuddin will merely make it worse through these constitutional amendments.

In the process, he will lose for PKR the support of liberals and moderates of all races who not only want better treatment of stateless people by giving them citizenship when deserved but also the amendments/repeal of existing laws to make for a more accountable government and greater discussion and debate of key issues without facing state sanction of any kind.

On both counts, Saifuddin has failed them - an unfit minister in charge of a rather important portfolio. - Mkini

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P GUNASEGARAM, as with many other Malaysians, has been waiting for some meaningful legislative changes since 2018.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.