jelas.info

Friends,

The time is has come, and it falls upon us to defend democracy and the primacy of suara rakyat above all.

In this pivotal moment, where a choice must be made between allowing money and power to determine who leads us and allowing the people to chose their own leaders; where there are none but ourselves left to stand and protect our right to determine our own fates, allow me to quote from a recently delivered speech:

Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Yes, I understand that we may one day be on the opposite side of the fence, and I hope that should a takeover of the federal government by crossover come to be a possibility, leaders of Pakatan Rakyat will also support a move to dissolve parliament in favour of fresh elections. I may not have fully realised the importance of doing so before, but I do now.

Yes, in the end the Sultan has a constitutional right to decide as he sees fit, and we may then be back to the question of whether the pre-signed letters of resignation for the 2 state seats are valid, and then see whether by-elections will be held.

All that said, it is my fervent belief that the interests of both Perakians and Malaysians as a whole is to let the most important stakeholder decide for themselves who is qualified to run the state of Perak: Perakians themselves, through statewide elections. Electoral results are hard to argue with.

The lack of confidence in BN leaders and the clear indications (as seen by recent trends) of what the results of a snap elections would be aside, I think it is fair to say that there is only way to (relatively) justly, equitably and decisively determine who Perakians want to lead them.

I feel that as a Malaysian, I have a stake in the decision to dissolve or not. I feel that I, and every conscientious Malaysian, should make their feelings felt to the Sultan, in an appeal to the palace’s better nature.

I intend to do this by showing up in Ipoh tomorrow night, insyallah. If I am able to make the necessary arrangements, my hope is to attend the solidarity gathering at the Perak Stadium at about 7pm, Thursday night, the 5th of February.

The major Pakatan leaders are expected to attend, I sincerely hope you will too.

It will be a bit of a drive, but I think it’s worth it to ensure that proper precedents are set, and to defend the future health of our democracy.

I remain hopeful that the palace will share the view that there are far too many uncertainties for either a Pakatan or BN led government to lay claim to legitimate, truly representative rule at this current juncture.

Interestingly, YM Sultan Azlan Shah himself is reported to have given a legal opinion on this very matter in the past:

While one cannot second guess the sultan, it would nevertheless be timely to be reminded of what the sultan himself wrote in his book Constitutional Monarchy, Rule of Law and Good Governance in 2004.

“Under normal circumstances, it is taken for granted that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong would not withhold his consent to a request for dissolution of parliament. His role is purely formal.”

He also added that no sultan or agung had withheld consent to dissolve legislative body, except in Kelantan in 1977.

His son seems to have the right ideas too. This very day, the news reported Raja Nazrin’s recent speech. Among other quotes:

Raja Nazrin said as the head of state and country, a Ruler must always ensure that whatever he said and did were not misinterpreted and misunderstood.

He added that the power entrusted by God must be discharged with responsibility because the Ruler would be judged in the hereafter.

“As such, power must be exercised to implement good practices. The Ruler’s nobility and honour, position and sovereignty do not come automatically,” he said.

So we’ve heard all the right talk; the right walk at this juncture will ensure the already high regard for the royal family of Perak for generations and generations to come.

So, rumours abound of Najib’s wet dream coming true (no, I’m not talking about anything Mongolian) – word is BN will offer to form the Perak government based on the 3 crossovers.

Before anyone gets their panties in a twist, I would strongly urge you to look at Malaysiakini’s undi.info numbers on the 2008 election results in Perak.

I’m going to do more detailed research on this soon and publish it. The conclusion should be that by no stretch of the imagination would any political observer predict a win for BN should there be snap elections in Perak called today.

If this is so, any BN-led government in Perak must be seen to be illegitimate and unrepresentative. Any attempt by BN to form a government in Perak that would aspire to even the lowest levels of honour and commitment to democracy should include announcing snap elections of their own.

Anyway, words are cheap. Lemme do the numbers for you and be right back.

Update: Well, here’s some of the legal opinion requested below, AND a potential answer as well to the question of – just how big is Najib’s warchest?

Roller coaster ride continues!

Some developments:

It appears that the legality of undated, pre-signed letters of resignation are still in question – any legal opinions or precedents on the matter (I heard someone mention a past case in Sabah or something)?

More excitingly, some opine that there is a rift, or at the very least a lack of coordinated strategy between Najib and Abdullah in this whole issue.

I forgot to mention yesterday, that one major factor fuelling this chaos is the fact that Najib probably craves some sort of win very desperately, with his image crumbling after Kuala Terengganu, Bota and so on.

Perak would have been the gift on the (as it were) silver platter. Take over the state government, be the hero! He even moved to personally oversee the Perak BN/Umno leadership – just in time to take all credit for any such coup d’etat (oh how funny it would be if it backfired).

Amidst all this, perhaps Abdullah is less than happy to see Najib become a glorified hero (don’t forget how tenuous the position of Abdullah and his cronies will be should the Najib ascendancy be realised). Either that, or he wants a piece of the action and credit too.

Pakatan has been equal to the political game thus far. Submitting the letters of resignation at this stage may or may not have been a tad premature, and perhaps not entirely popular (depending on what the two have to say after this) but perhaps it was done as a sign to any other Pakatan reps who were entertaining funny ideas.

In any case, I think the stakes are high here. It’s early to say conclusively, but the potential is there that we might be looking at the final showdown. If Pakatan were to increase its majority in Perak, and strike successfully in Negeri, we’ll probably get our new dawn for Malaysia. Let’s watch close!