UMNO minority government in Terengganu

TMI - Najib to meet with Barisan reps tonight in light of state political impasse

Datuk Seri Najib Razak will be meeting all Barisan Nasional (BN) Terengganu assemblymen tonight in Putrajaya, following the state’s political impasse, The Star Online reported. [...]

The Star Online also reported that the source said the assemblymen would also discuss numerous possibilities, including dissolving the state assembly.

The dissolving of the state assembly and rumours of fresh elections were abuzz in social media when Datuk Seri Ahmad Said was replaced by Datuk Ahmad Razif Abdul Rahman as Terengganu Menteri Besar yesterday.

These rumours were triggered when three Umno assemblymen - Ahmad Said, Ajil assemblyman Ghazali Taib and Bukit Besi assemblyman Roslee Daud - quit the party and turned independent representatives today, in reaction to the removal of Ahmad Said. [...]

It was reported earlier that Umno deputy president and Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin was also on his way to Kuala Terengganu to meet Ahmad Said to find a solution to the crisis.

Kaytee suspects those merajuking threesome, if true to form as per the typical UMNO kakis, are applying pressure (polite word here, wakakaka) on Najib to come up with some 'motivating solutions', wakakaka.

Mind you, there would of course be some genuine grievances on the part of ex-MB Ahmad Said who must have dearly wanted his daughter to be married on Saturday as the daughter of the State MB for 'various reasons' (face maybe, wakakaka).

The juicy Malaysian grapevine has it that Ahmad Said would have been replaced as MB immediately after the May 2013 state elections due to his poor election performance, but under a 'face-saving' deal, Najib agreed to let him hang on for an additional year.

If that had been the case, then Ahmad Said has reneged on that deal. I applaud Najib for standing firm in asking him to hand over the MB position to Ahmad Razif instead of allowing him to hang on until after Saturday ... because it's not unlikely he will find further excuses to hang on ..... indefinitely, wakakaka.

We need to also recall that Ahmad Said had been the personal choice of HRH.

Normally a constitutional monarchy, much as some don't believe, has very little choice in personally selecting the MB. Yes, he has to approve the choice of the party commanding the majority of the ADUNs or, with sound reasons, disapprove it.

Sound reasons must not be personal or frivolous, and should be something very serious along the line that the majority party's candidate for MB has a known vile criminal record or is known to be vocally and publicly anti-monarchy or is known publicly to be associated with an unsavoury incident, like bonking an underaged sweetie or suchlikes ... wakakaka.

But after Dr Mahathir left, some supporters of royalty must have seen AAB as most unlike Dr M - weak, indecisive and even apathetic enough to bully. So, maybe those monarchists, as HRHs' most loyal subjects, thought they might just claw back for their HRHs some of the royal prerogatives lost during the Mahathir days. Can you imagine them doing this when Mahathir was around?

We saw this 'Ops Clawback' happened in Perlis and Terengganu immediately after the March 2008 general/state elections.

The Perlis situation then was masked by the fact of an already unpopular Shahidan Kassim slated for the ‘outer’ even prior to the election. Because of UMNO HQ's lack of enthusiastic support for Shahidan, the Perlis royal prerogative by default became the ruling for that day.

It thus might have lent an incorrect impression that royalty would win in any tussle with a PM, especially one still bleeding from and licking his election wounds.

We need to remember that AAB's promise to Shahidan of the MB position was a last minute pre-election compromise worked out hastily to avoid intra party factional fighting prior to the election. When the election was over, I suppose AAB was hardly likely to put in much effort to rescue him from local UMNO manoeuvres. Hmmm, maybe there were even the wink, wink, nudge, nudge from UMNO HQ. I wouldn't put this beyond the Machiavellian politics of UMNO, wakakaka.

But it was a different story altogether with the Terengganu MB saga.

In March 2008 when the Terengganu palace went for broke with the MB issue, opting for Kijal assemblyperson Ahmad Said against an UMNO selected Jusoh, the 23 BN ADUNs voiced their intentions to boycott the ceremony.

The palace couldn't do what it did. If HRH had been unhappy with the choice of Idris Jusof as MB, then the constitutional process should have seen HRH informing the majority party, namely UMNO, to submit another name. But HRH as a constitutional monarch could not pick anyone as his personal preference for MB.

In fact, Professor Shad Faruqi, a constitutional law expert, pointed out clearly while the rulers have the constitutional rights to approve the appointment of MBs, they should NOT be involved in politics and do NOT have absolute discretion in making their choices, and ought not to allow personal feelings to colour their judgments.

Yes, a ruler should accept the majority political party’s choice, save in the most obvious case of a MB candidate who's mentally, physically or legally unfit to head the administration, or had been associated with unsavoury incidents, or where the coalition he/she heads isn't stable enough to endure the term until the next state election.

But from a constitutional point, the Malaysiakini report indicated that based on the legal advice provided by Prof Shad, HRH Terengganu had gone too far.

OK, we need to acknowledge that HRH wasn't impressed with Idris Jusoh and had indicated through his state's Regency Advisory Council (HRH was then also the Agong and his son was then only 11 years old) that he wanted a different person.

His unhappiness with Idris Jusoh was alleged to be about the heavy-handed police action leading to the Batu Buruk riot on 08 Sept 2007. HRH believed such a domestic brouhaha could have been managed without the use of live bullets.

Then HRH was additionally unhappy with the police teargas-ing PAS supporters on polling day in Rusila. The palace reckoned the Jusoh Administration had influenced the police to act in such drastic fashion.

Of course there was also the issue of Jusoh behaving with ‘apparent cockiness’, acting as though he was the sultan, making decisions unilaterally without consulting the royal household.

Aiyah, he should have consulted our most renowned 'Royal MB', wakakaka.

Of course, given HRH's concerns with Jusof, HRH had the right to inform the winning political party, BN-UMNO, or even the PM of his dissatisfaction with the BN's MB candidate.

Let's recapitulate what Prof Shad has advised: While a State ruler has the constitutional right to approve the appointment of the MB, he should NOT be involved in politics and do NOT have absolute discretion in making his choice.

In other words, he could not demand that his preferred candidate, namely Ahmad Said, be the MB.

But alamak the palace decided to take the deadlock to the edge by officially issuing an appointment letter to Ahmad Said. None of the 23 UMNO state reps was present at the ceremony, sticking to their earlier declarations.

went there to check on accommodations suitable for an ambassador

wakakaka 

Then, to thumb their ordinary noses at the royal person, Malaysiakini tells us that the state’s party leadership (was Putrajaya involved?) sacked Ahmad Said from UMNO in a meeting on 22 March 2008 – I take it poor Ahmad Said didn’t attend the UMNO meeting, wakakaka - perhaps he was having dinner at the palace, wakakaka.

The state UMNO's reason was that Ahmad Said ignored the party leadership’s directive not to take up the MB post. That would have been like telling pussycat not to eat the fish left in a bowl on the floor, wakakaka.

However Malaysiakini reported in Crisis deepens in Terengganu that Ahmad Said has the support of the seven out of eight Terengganu UMNO divisions leaders and members.

But really, could that have been so, when all 23 ADUNs (presumably also divisional leaders) did not support him, and indeed had sacked him a la the saga of an Anwar Ibrahim in 1998?

Then I had opined:

Most important of all, he [HRH] should consult the PM as well.

But then, without Dr M and with AAB, I had reckoned some royalty might have sensed a weak PM in his current political setback and were clawing back some of their lost pre-Merdeka prerogatives.

Through 'divide and conquer'?

I mentioned that HRH's assertive action, in selecting his own preferred candidate for the MB's post, had been constitutionally dangerous for Malaysian citizens, regardless of our ethnicity, religion or political affiliations; we couldn't and still can't afford to allow royalty to interfere directly with such political preserves as in our choice of parliamentary representatives (at both state and federal level); it's like usurping the people's democratic rights.

I mentioned I liked to see some bipartisan response especially from both PAS' Nik Aziz and Anwar Ibrahim, but alas, with the putative PR leader in an acrimonious relationship with the BN, in particular UMNO, selfish partisanship ruled the day.

Would the outcome of the choice of MB be different in March 2008 had there been firm bipartisan support and insistence on the proper constitutional process? I don't know but I always support what Ariff Sabri (Sakmongkol AK47) wrote of Bhai Karpal's core belief - that Bhai always fought for the supremacy of the law!

Regrettably Pakatan crowed when AAB and BN were in that sticky situation even though they were constitutionally right, while sang high praises of one particular royal individual as if he would become the silver bullet to exterminate the BN werewolves.

The tide turned months later in Perak. Did those PR song birds sing as joyfully as they did when AAB was caught in an imbroglio with the palace?

remember the tree of Democracy?

See! Even as way back as March 2008 I was already writing about 'being fair', wakakaka, but I was then abused as a BN cybertrooper and even today as a Najib supporter.

But I wonder whether Najib will be consulting the Terengganu Palace? wakakaka