To innovate is not to reform.
– Edmund Burke, British parliamentarian
The S-O-A-R (Spirit of Active Reform) seems grounded in Malaysia. It is the natural order of things with a sado-masochistic drive to cause strife, stoke discontent and sustain disharmony in the name of national unity!
Alexander Hamilton in # 62 of The Federalist Papers – the only expounder of the US Constitution – declared: “a good government implies fidelity to the object of government which is the happiness of the people.”
Hamilton hammered home another point: “A knowledge of the means by which that object can be best attained.” The Federalist Papers constitute a permanent guide to the intent, meaning, substance and purpose of the US Constitution.
America thinks it has reinvented, rethought and reset its fundamentals in matters of government and governance. The unstoppable corruption is now part of their common law.
Malaysia needs to reinvent itself with the 1998 spirit of Reformasi. PMX may have forgotten the price he paid to secure the liberty of change and reform. The recently touted House Arrest Bill doesn’t qualify as the S-O-A-R.
Sadhguru said that “in is the only way out”. Inner engineering must be taught in Malaysian learning institutions as the ultimate solution for a purpose-seeking citizenry.
Our Federal Constitution is a reference book of rights filled with definitions. When you define something, you automatically create borders that results in limiting, constraining and restraining the supreme law of the land.
To get the S-O-A-R airborne, government agencies and NGOs must conduct intensive and extensive national surveys in every constituency to gauge the public’s views and opinions as to how we can cure our socio-political ills. Elected legislators are unable to deliver.
The organs of state must be well-versed with public opinion. It is an accepted norm in Malaysia that salus populi est suprema lege (the welfare of the people is the supreme law) as pronounced in a celebrated case by the late great Justice Eusoffe Abdoolcader.
Government is on a frolic of its own when the legitimate expectations of the people are ignored if not forgotten. The Minister tasked with Law and Institutional Reform must placard ‘S-O-A-R’ in a prominent spot in her ministerial office wall.
Our government has built a powerful and effective mechanism that resists changing the status quo. We have, admittedly, developed an immunity to detest and reject reform and change.
“Dictators are allergic to reform, and they are cunning survivors. They will do whatever it takes to preserve their power and wealth, no matter how much blood ends up on their hands. They are master deceivers and talented manipulators who cannot be trusted to change,” remarked George Ayittey.
The S-O-A-R is not meant solely for halal certifications and the Mufti Bill 2024. Islam is the responsibility of State Rulers according to the Ninth Schedule, State List, Federal Constitution. Federalism shouldn’t hijack state jurisdictions despite the word salad enshrined in Part VI, Federal Constitution (Relations between the Federation and the States).
Our ill-maintained roads, traffic jams, toll roads, unkempt urban jungles, child molestation cases, mental health issues, and corruption ought to maintain the S-O-A-R at high altitudes instead of tolerating the maddening tidak apa attitude.
The S-O-A-R found loud utterance in Danaharta Urus Sdn Bhd v Kekatong Sdn Bhd (2003) when a seminal decision by the Court of Appeal struck down section 72 of the Danaharta Act which rooted an impediment to the issue of access to justice in Malaysia.
Unfortunately, this short-lived victory was rubbished by the Federal Court in 2005 by a sole written judgment of a Court of Appeal judge who sat on the panel under the provisions of Article 122(2) Federal Constitution!
The Danaharta ghost remains in the cemetery of Malaysia’s legal history with an ugly tombstone testifying to its putrid permanence. Politics and the Executive trump the separation of powers. And then they have nerve to call it a working democracy with an independent judiciary!
Democracy: government of the people, by the people, for the people. The ‘for’ in this hackneyed definition has wrought untold havoc to fundamental rights. The screams for change and reform remain unheard.
One former prime minister was reportedly quoted in a 1986 Time magazine interview concerning Malaysia’s judicial independence: “ . . . then we will have to find a way of producing a law that will have to be interpreted according to our wish.”
For 22 years, Malaysians had to put up with his “I-did-it-my-way” mantra when the S-O-A-R was being prepared for its final rites. It surfaced in 1998 (Reformasi) only to fizzle away. The stench of Executive overreach is still assailing our senses.
The S-O-A-R must constitutionally amend the appointment regime of the Senate. An Upper Chamber needs elected occupiers voicing and attending to the peoples’ choice for checks and balances.
As a S-O-A-R imperative, the reformed Senate can be established by two Senators from every Malaysian State without influence by political party puppet-masters or political party association or affiliation.
The S-O-A-R must take flight into our socio-political psyches. The welfare of the public is at stake. There is a host of unresolved issues that need urgent reform. PMX must worry less about GE-16.
Edmund Burke believed that reform can be camouflaged as innovation. We have to look within us to find a way out of this unholy mess. We started this. We have the right to end it.
The views expressed here are those of the columnist and do not necessarily represent the views of Sarawak Tribune.
