UMNO Tuah-Jebat Dilemma.

It is not for the speaker or his deputy to decide what the Parliament ought to speak or ought not to speak on substantive issues. I just know it is for the Parliament to debate and decide on all matters concerning Malaysia, including even constitutional provisions.

I am talking politics here, not legal, technical, procedural and rules which can all be made to subvert the true intent of the Parliament or to suit the power that be. I say forget it. I have no time to debate over the power of the speaker (or his deputy) to reject substantive motions. The speaker or the deputy are mere house keepers to ensure orderly conduct of the house, not on substantive matters that the members can or can not speak on. That to me was engineered over the years through abuse of power of the majority over the minority, period.

Today’s paper reports Anifah wanted to ascertain the correct number of foreigners, claiming it ranged from just 300,000 to 1.5 million. We thought some MPs are stupid, but this is the first proof we need. Would an illegal says, “Here I am, count me as an illegal”? Why do we call them “illegal” if a census on them can be done?

In light of this series of stupidity, I am inclined to call YB Lim to ignore Sabahans’ plight. But there are the ordinary people inside Sabah. Children committed suicide because of not enough food. Children not in school because inability of buying uniforms. Of course these are hardly the concern of Sabah MPs, like Kiandee or Anifah Aman.

Visit Runggus and Orang Sungai and you would see some of the poorest people in this planet. I have been moving throughout the length and breadth of W Malaysia and Sarawak and yet to see similar level of poverty. Though I don’t travel nowadays, I still have reports from SIB Pastors reporting from rural Sabah. The Sabah government only moved in once they knew that a SIB church had been established in a locality. Of course we can’t compete with them; we only by our prayers, the government with money and promises.

YB Lim, thank you for highlighting this. There are many poor and forgotten that raise their hands to heaven and thank God for a man like Lim Kit Siang. I am one among them.

(C) Samuel Goh Kim Eng – 260508
http://MotivationInMotion.blogspot.com
Mon. 26t May 2008.

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[kiandee]

“I know that YB Ipoh Timur is concerned about the issue but Sabah MPs, including me, are even more concerned about this issue.

…

“We want to give it some time since the new Government is only a few months’ old.

“We’ll have to be patient. We’ve been waiting for so long, we might as well wait a little longer and see what happens,” he said.
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It didn’t justify to say that since the issue had lasted for so long, thus it won’t need to be resolved ASAP. Furthermore, if BN had been given more than 10 yrs to resolve the issue by failed, on what ground does giving another 1 year will allowed the issue to be resolved? PM Abdullah had been on helm since 2004 yet the issue not solved. The current government is the same as the previous government. Is the so called giving more time will make it a different, when a solution was being tabled by MR Lim Kit Siang, which is to set up a royal commision to probe into it?

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[kiandee]
“There are proper avenues for us to discuss the motion and now this is a motion of thanks on the Royal Address. “Therefore, we do not have to set any condition in our motion of thanks,” he said.

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Mind you, if the only thing the MP can to do is to say “Thank You, your highness”, then please don’t waste tax payer’s money by having 222 MP having the parliment session there for so many days. Just publish the speech and having everybody say “Thank You. Your Highness” or just having the speech broadcasted via radio or publish in newspaper.

If the Federal Constitution makes token provisions for impartial judges by guaranteeing them tenure & immunity from arbitrary removal, what doesn’t the Constitution equally provide for the position of Speaker/Deputy Speaker?

There is a strong case to make constitutional amendments to enshrine safeguards promotive of neutrality regarding the post of Speaker/Deputy Speaker.

Some suggestions:

(a) The appointment of speaker should be by secret ballot;

(b) He can be appointed if his position were endorsed by not less than 2/3 votes of Parliament, and therefore he cannot continue in office if a motion of no confidence against him is not defeated by 2/3 votes of Parliament. Neither can government remove him unless it is supported by 2/3 votes of Parliament.

These safedguards are necessary if the office of speaker/deputy speaker be accorded the respect and confidence befitting its crucial importance to the parliamentary system based on democracy.

Wouldn’t such a motion of censure supported by 82 opposition members even if defeated on party lines place the speaker in an
untenable position??? Wouldn’t it reflect that he has lost the confidence of nearly ½ the House making it uncomfortable for him to sit on the Speaker chair?

If one aspires to make Parliament first world then we should depart from the convention of giving the post of speaker – the referee of parliament – to whoever the incumbent government favours confirmed by its majority vote.

The post should be occupied by someone proposed by the Prime Minister and other Members from the governing party after consultation with the Opposition – and also approved by the Opposition – regarding the candidate’s knowledge of parliamentary practices and, most important, his political neutrality and freedom from bias.

How do you, for example, have a meaningful football match if one has a referee who is bias in favour of one side and whistling foul all the time against the other side?

What does parliamentary convention and standing orders provide to remedy a situation of a bias speaker? What can the Opposition do?

To have acted against when there is a possibility of ignorance of such an important issue clearly evidence beyond a reasonable doubt of partisanship.

Clearly the speaker felt he had to show gratefulness to Badawi for putting him in the DS job and assist his fellow UMNO Sabah leaders.

Kiandee was reading from a prepared text!

He had more than 3 days to do research on precedence of amendment to motion of thanks.

And what he came up with was a prepared text to say it was not proper to do so. By saying he wasn’t aware was a blatant LIE!

He tried to stop LKS right from the onset. By saying tak payah baca!
From Hansard :
Timbalan Yang di-Pertua [Datuk Ronald Kiandee]: Yang Berhormat tidak perlu baca, Yang Berhormat.

Too bad the video quality is like that. If not you would have seen Kiandee reading from a piece of paper the prepared text.

So the question is what is the appropriate response (in light of these ‘mitigating’ considerations) to a Parliamentary Speaker who readily admitted that he was unfamiliar with parliamentary conventions and yet refused to apologise at the same time?

Me: Tell me what you have done ?
Bodohwi: I need more time.

Me: List down your achievements.
Bodohwi: I have work to do.

Me: What work have you done?
Bodohwi: I have a strong mandate from the rakyat.

You see, your boss is still in dreamland, and cannot even answer basic questions. Same goes for you. You are indeed a good disciple of Bodohwi.

CEMERLANG, GEMILANG, TEMBERANG – THE SLOGAN OF UMNO.

I am interested to see what the Sabah MP’s will do now.

Cross-over is the only option left for real affirmative action and not to continue to receive handouts and crumbs from the BN-UMNO table like well-conditioned running dogs.