Kedah’s (tag) Chief Minister resigns today. With that, the current acting Chief Minister is expected to be “appointed” as the new Chief Minister by the Prime Minister. My question is, since Malaysia is a federation, why should the new Chief Minister need to be chosen by the federal government instead of being elected into office by the people of Kedah?
Of course, one could say that it’s representative democracy; just as Malaysians don’t elect our Prime Minister directly, Kedahans don’t get to elect their Chief Minister directly too. But let’s face it, if the Prime Minister doesn’t approve, there’ll be problem even if there’s popular support.
The case is not limited to Kedah. Selangor’s Chief Minister himself was chosen into office by the federal government and wasn’t elected by the people of Selangor. The same case goes for Sabah – remember the cyclical premiership?
The only few exceptions to this in recent time are Kelantan since the early 90s and Terengganu in 1999. In both cases, a nutty opposition was in power.
It’s no accident that all the states with its Chief Minister appointed by the federal government are states controlled by Barisan Nasional, which is the ruling coalition. Does this look like BN is violating the principle of federation and decentralization? Though the division between state and federal power is still largely intact, if things don’t change, BN will overrun the spirit of the federation. Hell, BN’s already on that by emphasizing August 31 more than September 16.
Just to note, decentralization is part of green’s principles.
2 replies on “[693] Of Kedah’s Chief Minister and a threat to the spirit of the federation”
Actually, I don’t see a problem here. The Menteri Besar’s elected by his party (in this case, BN). During the state elections, the Kedah people voted for a BN state government. So therefore they would get a MB chosen by the state branch of either UMNO/MCA/MIC/Gerakan (usually UMNO, except for Penang).
Its the same in Australia as well.
How much influence the BN PM have on the appointment of MBs is largely due to the party’s power structure. Some, like the parties in Aus, the power structure for the state level of the parties is quite autonomous to that of it’s national level. Others, like UMNO, its power structure is obviously very intertwined with that of its national level.
Incidentally, that’s the drawback in perliamentary elections, where the voters don’t get to directly elect their MB/PM. But I don’t really see any major weakness in this. If the voters don’t like that new Kedah MB, they’re suppose to vote his whole party (including him) out in the next state elections.
You have a point but this is to provide stability to the country.It would be difficult if the incident of Datuk Harun (Ex-Selangor MD and UMNO Youth Chief)confront Tun Hussein Oon case happen again.
Pak Lah appear do not have enough support to move the reform he want like anti-corruption especially after a few of his Minister lost in UMNO Central committee.
By bring in more his own supporter. He is much more easier to pursue his agenda for the country