Johor’s new law on appointed assemblymen open to challenge, says lawyer

 Bastian Pius Vendargon says a Johor voter may have the necessary legal standing to commence an action challenging the state’s constitutional amendment.

On May 7, the Johor state assembly passed a constitutional amendment bill allowing for the appointment of five unelected assemblymen and increasing the total number of state representatives to 61. (Bernama pic)

PETALING JAYA:

A recent constitutional amendment bill passed by the Johor state assembly to allow for the appointment of five assemblymen may be challenged in court as being the antithesis of a true democracy, a constitutional lawyer said.

Bastian Pius Vendargon said parliamentary democracy hinges on the people’s will being represented in legislative bodies.

“Voters should have a say in who represents them in a state legislative assembly,” he told FMT.

Vendargon was commenting after DAP deputy chairman Nga Kor Ming claimed that the Johor government’s move to introduce appointed assemblymen went against the Federal Constitution.

Nga said it also does not reflect the practices of a mature democracy or political culture as it allows politicians to become assemblymen via a “backdoor”.

“These appointed assemblymen aren’t elected by the people. They don’t have a constituency that they serve, but receive the salaries of assemblymen and have the power to raise issues and vote on bills in the state assembly,” said Nga, a federal minister.

Despite protests from Pakatan Harapan, the Johor state assembly passed the constitutional amendment bill on May 7, allowing for the appointment of five unelected assemblymen and increasing the total number of state representatives to 61.

Johor is the fourth state to have appointed assemblymen, after Sabah, Terengganu and Pahang.

Vendargon said a Johor voter may have sufficient legal standing to commence legal action to challenge the state law.

“It may be good to obtain the judicial view from our courts on the constitutionality of such actions and state’s constitutional amendments, in light of the fundamental legal principle that democracy is a fundamental feature of our constitution, and that the people’s voting rights are a central feature to ensure rule by those elected by the people,” he said.

Vendargon said that although such a practice exists in some states or territories, its constitutional validity has not been fully challenged.

“While a decision on constitutionality will set a precedent, a declaration may be specific to the Johor issue,” he added.

Lawyer Fahri Azzat said the amendment has serious governance and financial implications.

Fahri said any legal challenge would not affect the position in other states as each state has its own constitution.

He said an explanation needs to be given as to who qualifies to be appointed to the legislative assembly, who the appointees would be, and why the current setup is insufficient.

Menteri besar Onn Hafiz Ghazi, who tabled the bill, said the appointed assemblymen would not be elected, but selected to complement the existing composition of the state assembly.

“It appears the amendment also allows for greater executive control of state legislature which is against the Federal Constitution,” Fahri said. - FMT

Scam victim asks why banks, BNM allowed transactions to flagged accounts

 The central bank says a Semakmule listing does not by itself prove wrongdoing or automatically result in account restrictions.

A lawyer who lost RM155,000 in a scam now wants answers from the authorities. (Envato Elements pic)

PETALING JAYA:

Losing RM155,000 to swindlers over a 10-day period has left a lawyer wondering how money can be so easily moved into accounts that have already been flagged on suspicion of scam.

To make matters worse for the victim, who wishes to be known as TD, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) had been evasive when answers were sought from them, citing confidentiality as reason for not divulging information.

She said complaints to the Ombudsman for Financial Services and the Public Complaints Bureau also drew similarly cautious responses.

TD’s ordeal began on Dec 11, 2024 with an offer of a part time job with a firm that purportedly did online hotel reservations and writing reviews.

She was asked to pay a “small fee” to join the company, with a promise that it would be returned later along with commissions for tasks she completed.

But the company then began to demand more and larger sums of money while instructing her to complete more tasks before she could recover all that she had paid.

At one point, she was even told by the swindlers that the green light from BNM was required before her money could be returned to her.

It was then that she realised she had been duped. She lodged a police report on Dec 21, 2024.

TD later discovered that the bank account she had been transferring money to had been flagged by Semakmule “six to eight times”.

Semakmule is a portal where people can check bank accounts, phone numbers and company names to see if any of them is linked to financial scams.

TD then raised the matter with the banks and the central bank, querying why they did not stop transfers flowing into accounts flagged on Semakmule.

“They kept talking about the fact that I authorised the transfer, but that is not my question,” she told FMT.

“My question is why accounts with multiple (Semakmule) alerts were still allowed to receive money, and why the banks’ systems did not detect the suspicious pattern,” she said.

She added that BNM also did not explain why the accounts remained active or why the warning signs did not trigger an early response.

BNM just repeatedly cited confidentiality for not divulging any information, she added.

She also alleged that some of her follow-up emails to the governor had been deleted unread, though the central bank later said this might have been due to an IT issue.

She said the ombudsman gave “exactly the same answer” as BNM while the bureau merely told her the central bank had already replied.

In response to questions from FMT, the central bank said a Semakmule listing does not by itself prove wrongdoing or automatically result in account restrictions.

It said the Semakmule platform is managed by the police and functions as a public awareness and prevention tool.

“Banks are expected to act based on their own checks, verified information and the law,” BNM said.

However, the central bank did not say whether the banks involved had acted properly in this case, or whether repeated alerts and unusual transfer patterns should have triggered stronger action earlier. - FMT

Career progression is not betrayal

 Doctors leave the public healthcare system mostly because their sacrifices are not appreciated, yet they are accused of prioritising money over service.

From Abirami Shavani

There is a tendency to scrutinise doctors who leave the public healthcare system for better opportunities elsewhere, as though pursuing career advancement is somehow an act of betrayal.

Frankly, this assumption is unfair and deeply misplaced.

Why should anyone be condemned for accepting a better offer after years of hard work, training, and sacrifice?

In every other profession, career progression is celebrated. People are congratulated for climbing the ladder, expanding their experience, and improving their quality of life.

Yet when doctors do the same, they are labelled as selfish, disloyal, or lacking patriotism.

Consider a simple analogy. A finance graduate starts work as a financial analyst, gains experience, earns additional qualifications, and eventually becomes a senior advisor.

Another company then offers him better pay and benefits. If he chooses to accept the offer, nobody questions his morals. Nobody accuses him of abandoning society. It is seen for what it is: professional growth.

Now apply that same logic to medicine.

A doctor spends years in government hospitals completing housemanship and medical officer training before entering specialist training.

Many continue even further into subspecialty fellowships, taking on increasingly complex cases and heavier responsibilities. The higher the expertise, the greater the burden.

Yet despite the enormous responsibility placed on these doctors, many continue to work under exhausting and unpredictable conditions.

Overtime often goes uncompensated. Weekends disappear into ward rounds and emergency calls. Phone consultations continue long after office hours.

Family life repeatedly takes second place because patient care always comes first.

Then one day, that same consultant receives an offer elsewhere with perhaps better pay, more reasonable working conditions, improved resources, or simply a chance to live a more balanced life while still practising medicine.

Would it really be fair to call that doctor a traitor?

Doctors who leave the public system are not abandoning healthcare. They are still treating patients, performing surgeries, answering emergencies, and dedicating their lives to medicine.

The difference is that they have chosen an environment that values their expertise more appropriately.

In any functioning organisation, when valuable employees begin leaving, leadership reflects why retention is failing.

Efforts are made to improve working conditions, compensation, and morale. Instead, what many doctors receive are lectures about patriotism and accusations that they are prioritising money over service.

This narrative is not only insulting, but also dangerous.

Healthcare workers are already stretched thin, trying to keep an overburdened system functioning. Guilt-tripping them for seeking sustainability does not solve the problem.

It merely diverts attention from the real issue: a system that has relied too heavily on sacrifice while offering too little in return.

Doctors are empathetic people. That empathy is precisely why many continue showing up despite burnout, exhaustion, and emotional strain.

But empathy should never be mistaken for an obligation to tolerate dysfunction indefinitely.

This is not a story about greedy doctors leaving. It is a warning sign that something within the system is failing.

Instead of criticising those who go for better opportunities, policymakers should ask a far more important question: why are so many no longer willing to stay?

Because no healthcare system can survive forever by depending solely on sacrifice to keep it alive. - FMT

Dr Abirami Shavani is an ophthalmologist at a private medical centre in Ipoh.

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

PN chair Samsuri’s attempt at moderation undercut by Hadi

 Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar tries to reach for the middle octaves, but PAS supremo Abdul Hadi Awang does not budge from his simplistic decrees.

By Terence Netto

Following his appointment as Perikatan Nasional chairman in mid-February, Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar was always going to have a hard time striking the appropriate rhetorical notes.

Such notes, of course, would require the Terengganu menteri besar to tack to the middle rather than tread the pathways that would certify him as a Malay and Muslim right-winger.

He appropriately did so earlier this month in a Facebook posting that described Malaysia’s multiracial society as “an incomparable blessing from God.”

That was a refreshingly startling thing to say, coming from a leader of PAS, a party seen as rigidly ideological.

Samsuri said further that all politicians must remember that they are to lead all Malaysians, not just the Malays or any particular community.

This view is something that would be difficult to reconcile with the requirement that a leader would have to be Muslim in order to lead PAS, the largest party with 43 seats in the Dewan Rakyat.

If Samsuri were to become prime minister of Malaysia, he would have to be walking on egg shells to bear in mind that he is a leader for all Malaysians.

Readers of Samsuri’s Facebook posting gained almost an immediate intimation of the difficulty of that task when PAS supremo Hadi Awang put up a Facebook posting in which he beckoned Umno to “return to the right path.”

What would that entail for Umno?

Umno would have to, according to Hadi, stop allying with “liberal” PKR and “extremely secular” DAP.

These days, critics of PKR and DAP would be hesitant to describe the former as liberal and the latter as extremely secular.

Their criticisms are why both parties are in trouble with their supporters for tardiness in implementing political and economic reform that both have been fighting for since the late 1990s.

Broadly, critics blame Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim for the lackadaisical pace of the reformasi programme.

It was sustained public support for that programme that brought PKR and DAP to being in the driver’s seat in the negotiations among major parties to form the unity government led by Anwar in November 2022, after GE15 resulted in a hung parliament.

Now PKR and DAP, as part of the Pakatan Harapan grouping, are in trouble with their supporters for the lethargic pace of reform after three and a half years as part of the Madani government.

A leader of the stature of Hadi who terms PKR as unpalatably “liberal” and DAP as “extremely secular” would be at odds with the throng of reformasi supporters who see nothing indefensibly liberal and extremely secular with the reformasi programme.

In short, it may be that Hadi Awang is out of sorts with reformasi.

That of course raises the question of whether Samsuri is also in the same situation.

It is understandable that Samsuri, wanting to tread close to the centrist positions of somebody who aspires to be prime minister of Malaysia, would want to sound the middle octaves.

But he has his boss in PAS to contend with. That’s no easy thing. - 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.