THANK you, Hafiz Hassan, for kindly responding to my article, Prime Minister, just convene Parliament. 

Appreciate your outlining the procedures since it is the first meeting of the year. My lawyer friend also reminded me of Articles 38 and 40 of the constitution where the advice of the cabinet or of a minister acting under the general authority of the cabinet reigns supreme. Yes, we have to follow procedure but this is not business-as-usual conditions. 

If we cannot do away with it, have the “mesyuarat khas” immediately and the Special Committee to burn the midnight oil to review the Standing Orders.

Whether it is “unlocking” of Parliament or “house-warming”, just do it because things are getting out of control.

But as you said, it’s for the prime minister to make the call. The Conference of Rulers made the “as soon as possible” call and hopefully, the former will not delay further. In February, the Agong stated that Parliament can convene during the emergency on a date that His Majesty deems suitable, on the advice of the prime minister.

The reason for the proclamation was the Agong was satisfied that a grave emergency exists whereby the security, economic life and public order in Malaysia was being threatened by reason of the Covid-19 epidemic.

Further, Section 2 of the Ordinance provides for the establishment of an independent special committee (“Committee”) to advise the Agong on the continuing existence of the emergency arising from the Covid-19 epidemic.

We used the Agong to declare emergency but the Agong cannot have a say on convening Parliament without the advice of the prime minister. Also, the Committee to advise the Agong was only formed months later.

Is this how we treat our Agong? Whatever happened to “Raja adalah payung kedaulatan negara”?

I do not wish to discuss Article 55 of the constitution, the Emergency (Essential Powers) Ordinance 2021 or Parliament Standing Order.

A minister rightly or wrongly justified that Parliament won’t convene because 100 MPs were above 61 years old and a high-risk group.  

It would be hard to believe that the emergency will be lifted on August 1, given the number of infections and deaths increasing at an alarming rate. When declared, infections were less than 300,000 and deaths around 1,000. Less than six months later (June 29), it bloated to 746,000 and 5,108 respectively.

However, there is hope when the Dewan Rakyat deputy speaker indicated that Parliament would be convening “soon” following his audience with the Agong yesterday. The Conference of Rulers expressly said they saw no need for the emergency to continue after August 1.

Since the government is considering allowing companies to resume operations if all workers are fully vaccinated, why can’t Parliament convene where members have been vaccinated?

Be that as it may, what will happen when Parliament convenes?

Will we still have clowns or “court jesters” around when issues are discussed or will it be a meeting of the intelligentsia? We just don’t have time to entertain the former.

Will there be elbowing on who will be the next prime minister or announcements of statutory declarations supporting them followed by press conferences?

Or will they seriously discuss how the raging pandemic has affected people’s livelihood with real examples from their respective constituencies.

Ask for numbers other than the daily Covid-19 statistics. Numbers that show how adversely the rakyat have been affected directly and indirectly. Follow-up on SOP non-compliance cases by Members of Parliament and VIPs. 

The government should be more transparent on matters such as how the budget provided for the vaccines were allocated and spent. Ask what the other ministries have done to help contain the pandemic and their day-to-day tasks.

I am experiencing a case where a few months have passed and a government department has not been able to send a response. 

If the sitting is just like the usual, do we really need to convene Parliament?

What say you? – June 30, 2021.

* Saleh Mohammed 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.