I REFER to the report “Pakatan wants urgent parliamentary sitting to discuss Covid-19”.

The Pakatan Harapan (PH) presidential council has now urged Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin to call for a special Parliament sitting ahead of the original scheduled date of May 18.

There have been several calls for Parliament to sit urgently. It is humbly submitted that such calls are legitimate. In a time of crisis, the role of Parliament is more vital than ever to make and pass laws, to authorise spending and to scrutinise government action.

So how can Parliament continue to function during a pandemic?

The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), which is the global organisation of national parliaments, is currently sharing and exploring approaches to parliamentary sittings with the objective of helping parliaments around the world to continue to function as effectively as possible during the pandemic.

The IPU has observed that:

• Parliament can meet physically, but with restrictions. These restrictions may include fewer sittings of plenary sessions or committees, fewer parliamentarians and staff in the building with some working remotely, changes to the venue of parliamentary meetings, for example, using a bigger building that allows for more effective social distancing.
• Parliament can meet virtually using remote working methods. Technical infrastructure for remote meetings is widely available through commercial providers. Many parliaments are already exploring options for remote working tools.

As such, some parliaments are modifying laws and procedures to allow for remote working. For example, Spain and Brazil have amended their respective procedures to allow chambers to sit virtually. Other parliaments are relaxing their rules to allow virtual committee sittings, such as the United Kingdom’s House of Commons.

Some parliaments are also adapting quorum rules for voting remotely or looking at how they can interpret the rules.

Be that as it may, the message is clear: Parliament has to sit, and for good reasons. In the words of Anne Twomey, professor of constitutional law at the University of Sydney:

“In an emergency, maintaining public confidence in government is essential. One way of supporting this is to ensure parliament can operate, to scrutinise government action and represent the wishes of the people.”

The learned professor implores that even “if the physical presence of MPs is not possible due to a pandemic, there is good reason to ensure such scrutiny and representation can occur by electronic means.”

Apart from Canada’s House of Commons, which reconvened recently on March 24, there is another parliamentary sitting which is exemplary. In its compilation of parliamentary sittings around the world in response to the pandemic, the IPU shares on how the Parliament of Mongolia (State Great Hural) recently held the opening of its spring session on April 6 using electronic technology for the first time.

It was reported that members of parliament attended the session in five chambers, seated at pre-assigned desks at a distance of at least 1.5m, using an intramural TV conferencing system inside the parliament building. All committee and open hearings will also be organised in these chambers.

So, parliaments around the world are sitting, and passing laws. On Tuesday, it was the Turkish parliament that sat and passed a law that allows tens of thousands of prisoners to be released from jails to ease overcrowding and protect detainees from the Covid-19. 

Given the calls, it looks like it is the wish of the people that Dewan Rakyat sits urgently. If nothing else, it is to make and pass laws.

The country badly needs a Covid-19 law to provide for temporary measures – from aiding the people and businesses to providing appropriate sentences for offences against measures to contain and prevent the spread of the disease.

Otherwise, when eventually the movement-control order is lifted, the country may be ill-equipped to face post-pandemic legal realities.

God forbids. – April 16, 2020.

* Hafiz Hassan reads The Malaysian Insight.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.