Muhyiddin should convene two-day emergency meeting of Parliament to approve his economic stimulus package and debate the earliest possible re-start of the Malaysian economic engine

Yesterday, in his live telecast announcing a RM250 billion economic stimulus package, the Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin stressed that “this government cares for you” although it was not the government that Malaysians voted for in the 14th General Election two years ago.

For this reason, it is important and imperative that Muhyiddin should be reminded that Malaysia is still a parliamentary democracy and that he should convene a two-day emergency meeting of Parliament to approve his economic stimulus package so that it would have credibility and legitimacy.

There should be no other business for the emergency meeting of Parliament, whether it be question-and-answer session, a “no confidence” motion against the Prime Minister, election for a new Speaker or any other business except for a debate to approve the RM250 billion economic stimulus package.

The debate will also allow Members of Parliament to convey the views of the people with regard to the invisible war against the Covid 19 virus and the triple whammy of public health, economic and information crisis in Malaysia as a result of the Covid 19 outbreak.

When Muhyddin announced the economic stimulus package yesterday, the Prime Minister’s Office also released an 24-page infographics on “Pakej Rangsangan Ekonomi Prihatin Rakyat 2020”.

The infographics opened with the global and domestic impact of the Covid 19 pandermic, both in terms of the outbreak in total global infections and deaths and its effect on the economy, but it is very clear that the infographics were using figures far behind time when the Covid-19 was raging at an exponential speed worldwide.

The infographics showed that globally, the Covid-19 pandemic had reported 434,000 cases and about 20,000 deaths, when at the time that Muhyiddin was delivering his live telecast, the number of Covid-19 cases globally had passed the half-million mark and had reached 536,639 cases with 24,117 deaths..

The use of the projections by a study at Imperial College London that if the Covid-19 pandemic is left unchecked, there could be 2.2 million deaths in the United States and 510,000 deaths in the United Kingdom is most irresponsible and alarmist.

All this, as well as ideas for a more effective public health strategy to contain the Covid-19 outbreak in Malaysia and the earliest possible re-start of the Malaysian economic engine, should be the subject of debate of an emergency meeting of Parliament, which should be held within a week or two.