WHAT do you think should be the fate of seven representatives who were expelled from Bersatu after declaring support for the prime minister (PM) and the Selangor menteri besar, respectively, over the past year? Your opinion will reflect your thinking on the role of politicians in a democratic nation.
These Members of Parliament (MPs) and one Selangor state assemblyman had stood on the Opposition platform in the 2022 general election and won their seats. One of the MPs is also the state assemblyman for Nenggiri in Gua Musang, Kelantan.
While the Opposition had decided that the seven must vacate their seats, the Dewan Rakyat speaker and the Selangor state assembly speaker ruled that they need not do so. However, the Kelantan speaker ruled that the Nenggiri state seat had fallen vacant. A by-election will be held on Aug 17.
Some legal experts claim that the rulings by the parliament and Selangor assembly speakers expose a weakness in the Anti-Party Hopping Act which requires all MPs and assemblymen to toe their party line.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim seems to agree: on July 12, he said that in 2022, Pakatan Harapan (PH) had proposed that “anyone rejected by their party should vacate their seat, but it was not agreed upon by the government then.”
A clear-cut situation occurred in Malacca, with the state assemblyman for Rembia successfully defending his seat in 2021 under Barisan Nasional. The assemblyman left Umno to join PAS last year. Should he be required to vacate his seat?
The overwhelming public sentiment is that if you betray your party, you betray the voters’ trust and must vacate your seat and seek re-election under a different party. A minority sentiment is that the MPs should continue as Independents.
At the beginning of this Adam and Eve series, we explained that when humans fall into a bifurcated way of thinking, splitting all their experiences into “I versus you” and “we versus them”, devastating consequences will follow.
Bifurcation not only creates ethnic hostility and sets interfaith relations on fire, it also generates political warfare and divides a nation into combative halves: one-half must always oppose the other. This means every Opposition representative must oppose the prime minister (PM), and since the Opposition has been elected by half the population, it means that half the people of Malaysia oppose the PM.
As Gerakan president Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong said at the party’s lifetime members’ AGM in 2016: “In our country, we politicise everything. Whatever comes out from the other side (the opposition), we go against it and what comes from our side of the political divide is always right. That is how we are.”
Is this the correct application of democratic principles? It was American president Abraham Lincoln who captured the essence of democracy in this succinct line uttered during his Gettysburg Address in 1863: “Government of the people, by the people, for the people.”
Did he say: “Government of the people, by the party, for the people?” No, he did not. If one-half of the people oppose the PM – whether it is PH or Perikatan Nasional (PN) – can any party claim to be a government of the people?
This term, “the people”, means all law-abiding people, and not half of them, more than half or less than half. If it is not a government of all law-abiding people, it is also not a government by the people and for the people.
Imagine a public-listed company with all its heads of department split into two rival camps that are in opposition all the time. Do you think the company will flourish or flounder?
Look at the fate of the world’s oldest democratic nation (Britain) and the world’s leading democratic nation (the US).
Britain has fallen into stagnation and the people are so fed up that they decisively threw out the Conservative Party in a landslide defeat for them in July’s general election and replaced it with the Labour Party. But in the 2010 general election, they similarly delivered a landslide blow to Labour and voted in the Conservatives.
The US is falling into disarray, with the Republicans and Democrats opposing each other on every item in the national agenda. The people of America are split into two camps, and a nation that claims to defend the international rule of law is unable to stop its spiralling gun violence.
If you think that the developing world is doing better politically, look at the situation in South Africa. This was the country that all democratic nations pitched in to help develop into a shining light with the abolishment of apartheid. The light has been replaced by an enveloping darkness: economic stagnation, rampant crime, falling public services and grotesque corruption.
One major cause of the decline is patronage. “Loyalists are appointed to public jobs on the basis of loyalty to the party, not competence,” The Economist weekly revealed in May. It is the same in Malaysia where political analysts have long noted that devotion to the party agenda counts for more than competence.
Political parties insist that once a candidate is elected on its platform, he must uphold the party’s interests. Why is there such an insistence? It is because of the way the game is designed. Last year saw a flurry of revelations that an MP earns at least RM25,700 monthly.
It consists of a RM16,000 salary, RM900 phone allowance, fixed travelling allowance of RM1,500, a driver’s allowance of RM1,500, payments for attending meetings, daily subsistence allowance and a special allowance of RM1,500 if he is not a minister, deputy minister, parliamentary secretary or political secretary. There are also food and travelling allowances for going overseas on duty.
In the private sector, you will need to be a C-suite to earn this amount, and the position requires you to work the longest hours and be dedicated.
Furthermore, an MP who serves multiple terms can receive multiple pensions amounting to over RM100,000 a month and more than RM1 million in gratuity.
So, everybody in politics wants to get elected, and they seek the nomination of a political party. This is why they are heavily obligated to be steadfastly loyal to party interests above all else. Those who stop playing the game are expected to resign.
Last year, a survey of voters in 19 democratic nations found that the majority had lost faith in their political leaders because they were prioritising the interests of the party over the people. Politicians are seen to be predatory and stress party interest above public interest.
This is the background with which you should form your opinion about MPs and assemblymen who go against party directives. Are they doing it for personal gain or is it for public interest? You must also ask whether the elected representatives who have voiced support for the Pakatan Harapan government will do so on all matters or only when a decision benefits the people.
No politician today, not even in Britain, remembers the famous 1774 speech that British MP Edmund Burke made upon winning in the Bristol constituency: “Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests, which interests each must maintain as an agent and advocate against other agents and advocates, but parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation with one interest, that of the whole; where, not local purposes, not local prejudices ought to guide,but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole. You choose a member, indeed, but when you have chosen him, he is not a member of Bristol but he is a member of parliament.”
One of the wisest statements ever made was that by His Majesty, Sultan Ibrahim, now the King. He said last year that in place of pihak pembangkang (opposition), the term pihak pengimbang (balancing force) should be considered. This is because the Opposition’s role is more than just to merely oppose but to play the role of check and balance.
In nature, there is a balance of matter and anti-matter as opposites with a slight surplus of matter. Does anti-matter set out to fight matter? No. In fact, anti-matter has proven useful in treating certain types of advanced cancer.
However, in Malaysia, the only people playing a check-and-balance role are the King and Sultans. Politicians are busy hitting the war drums. During the run-up to the 2022 general election, the state chief of one party famously uttered the words: “... the GE15 war drums have been sounded and all members must be prepared for this.”
That is a light statement when you compare it to a Dewan Rakyat sitting in 2019 when shouts of “declaration of war” and “whoever wants a war, we welcome a war” echoed throughout the chamber.
Last year, the youth wing of one party held a military-like parade with symbols resembling weapons and songs emphasising the theme of war.
In the sixth article of this series, we shall discuss why it is becoming essential for all political parties to develop a common agenda for Malaysia, and campaign only on differences in strategy. To whet your appetite, ask yourself: What are the top 10 concerns for all Malaysians that our political parties should focus on?
The writer champions interfaith harmony. Comments: letters@thesundaily.com
