KUCHING: Making statutory declarations (SD) is not the best way to try form a government or bring a government down, said a political analyst.
In fact, according to a political science professor of Universiti Putra Malaysia and Fellow of the Malaysian Academy of Sciences Datuk Professor Dr Jayum Jawan, the SD is not a practice in a parliamentary democratic system.
The best method would be a vote of no confidence in the Dewan Rakyat, he said.
“If there are any doubts about the government’s legitimacy, then the best method is to propose a vote of no confidence during the parliamentary session,” said Jayum.
“SDs can be used as long as parliament is not in session, but the ultimate goal is a vote of confidence or a vote of no confidence to uphold the government or to bring down a government.”
Jayum said that since the General Election (GE) 2018, the federal government seems to be on the edge because there is no main party with absolute majority.
But according to him the formation of the government depends on support from various parties to get a majority to enable them to rule.
Therefore, he said when there are rumours that members of parliament or party supporters want to leave, these rattle the government.
He said this will continue until the main party in the ruling coalition has its own majority.
Only then can their government be strong because they would not depend on parties that take advantage because there may be better offers from their opponents.
Jayum thinks the unity government under the leadership of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim will always face the possibility that it will be overthrown due to several reasons.
“Firstly, the opposition party has a relatively large number of parliamentary seats and secondly when there is a better offer to the component parties of the unity government, politicians will weigh the “profit/loss” in giving support, that is the common behaviour of politicians.
“Thirdly, if the unity government does not fulfill the promised work, then the supporters will look elsewhere in search of more lucrative profits,” he added.
