Malaysiakini: SULTAN USED HIS HEAD BUT NOT HIS HEART?

Source: Malaysiakini

In what appears to be a unique situation, Perak by the end of today would have two menteris besar - Pakatan Rakyat’s Mohd Nizar Jamaluddin and Barisan Nasional’s Zambry Abd Kadir.

MCPX

On one side, we have Mohd Nizar who is refusing to resign as requested by Sultan Azlan Shah. And on the other, we have Zambry whom the sultan approved as BN seemed to have the majority of seats in the state assembly.

We have a MB who represents the majority in the state assembly as elected by the people in the last general election. At the same time, we will have a state leader who is one by default as a result of defections.

Mohd Nizar’s reasons to stick to his ground are quite valid. He is right in disputing the sultan’s request for him to step down as the new majority held by BN could seep away if the court rules in favour of the state speaker in declaring the three state seats vacant.

Never mind the court ruling – it may take some time to materialise. The least the sultan could have suggested was for a vote of confidence taken at the assembly before he asked Mohd Nizar to resign and hand over power to BN.

However, the sultan was quite adamant on what he wanted – for Mohd Nizar to step down immediately, and a few hours later, he backed the appointment of Zambry as the new menteri besar.

Sultan Azlan Shah has overruled Mohd Nizar’s repeated request for the dissolution of the state assembly, which would pave the way for fresh state elections.

And by so doing, the sultan who was a former lord president and an eminent reader of the law, had caused a constitutional crisis in Perak.

In defence of the sultan

DAP leader Lim Kit Siang put it rightly when he said that Mohd Nizar was still the legitimate menteri besar until he has been voted out by a "no confidence" motion in the state assembly.

“Until such time, there is no vacancy in the post of Perak menteri besar,” he said in his statement today.

In the defence of the sultan, it can be said that he read the state constitution rightly, and literally, in asking for the resignation of Mohd Nizar.

The sultan, rightly or wrongly, must have been convinced of what state Umno/BN leader Najib Abdul Razak told him at a meeting yesterday morning – that BN enjoyed the majority support in the state assembly.

The sultan also individually questioned the four defectors – of which three are independents and one who had returned to Umno – of their support for the BN government.

He also got an undertaking from them that they will continue to support the new BN government.

And with that, the sultan decided that Mohd Nizar does not have the majority support of the assembly which the BN enjoyed now, and that there was no need to dissolve the assembly as he can ask the Pakatan government to step down and hand power over to the BN.

These are all fair and right as far as the sultan’s reading of the state constitution, especially the important Article 16(6) of the constitution.

And many legal experts will also agree with the sultan’s reading of the constitution, never mind the fact that the status of the three independents are still under dispute.

However, it must be said that while the sultan had used his legal mind to the matter, he had failed in thinking as the ruler of his subjects.

There are at least three factors that the sultan seemed to have missed in making his decision to hand over power to BN.


Sorry lah. I'm only a lay man not a legal expert. So, based on Article (16), the IF is really questionable as the status of the three independents are still under dispute.