Ismail Sabri must not miss the opportunity to make history by making the July/August meeting of Parliament a historic “Reform Parliament”

The most unexpected Prime Minister in Malaysian history, Ismail Sabri, must not miss the opportunity to make history by making the July/August meeting of Parliament a historic “Reform Parliament”.

He can do this by asking the Cabinet tomorrow to instruct and empower the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar to make the 14-day meeting of Parliament from July 18 to August 4, 2022 a historic Reform Parliament by implementing a number of reform measures as making into law the anti-party hopping legislation for Members of Parliament and the abolition of mandatory death sentence legislation.

Wan Junaidi has said yesterday that the government expected to table the necessary amendments to abolish mandatory death sentences in 11 law provisions during a Parliament session in October and that January 2023 will the deadline for the implementation for the abolition of mandatory death sentences in Malaysia.

The Cabinet tomorrow should press Wan Junaidi to present the necessary amendments to abolish mandatory death sentences in the July/August meeting of Parliament, but if his cannot be done, it should come out with a clear commitment to present the necessary legislative amendments in Parliament by October.

There should also be firm Cabinet commitments, viz:

1. Moratorium on the execution of the death penalty during the interim;
2. Making public the Richard Malanjum Report on the Alternative Punishments to the Mandatory Death Penalty;
3. Parliament will not be dissolved for the 15th General Election until the Royal Assent is given for the anti-party hopping legislation and the abolition of the mandatory death penalty.

The July/August 2022 meeting of Parliament will really be historic if it could also act on the Yang di Pertuan Agong’s advice to formulate a long-term plan to ensure that Malaysia can achieve its aspiration to be a world-class great nation by returning to the nation-building principles our founding fathers have agreed in the Malaysian Constitution and Rukun Negara – constitutional monarchy, parliamentary democracy, separation of powers, rule of law, good governance, public integrity, respect for human rights, Islam as the religion of the nation and freedom of worship for all other religions and national unity from our multi-racial, multi-lingual, multi-religious and multi-cultural diversity where there are no first-class and second-class citizens whether based on race, religion or region.

In the last half-a-century, Malaysia had lost its way to ensure that Malaysia become a world-class great nation and is in danger of becoming a failed state in the next few decades if there is no reset of the nation-building principles set out in the Malaysian Constitution and the Rukun Negara.

Why had Malaysia failed to achieve the 30-year Vision 2020 to create a Bangsa Malaysia and meet the nine strategic challenges in Vision 2020?

We have failed in the National Integrity Plan for Malaysia to be among the top 30 countries with the least corruption by 2008.

We cannot even fulfil the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013-2025 (MEB) objective to spearhead educational transformation of the country as we are set to flop in the MEB objective for Malaysia to be above global average and be in top one-third of countries in international educational standards in global assessments like Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and (Trends in international Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) in 2025.

The July/August 2020 Parliament meeting will be even more historic if it could initiate a new anti-corruption campaign in Malaysia in view of worsening rampant corruption at all levels in the country as illustrated by the following developments:

1. The recent revelation that the former Chief Secretary to the Government was paid RM30,000 a month for doing nothing in 1MDB and the shocking disclosure that this is not an isolated case in government-controlled companies (GLCs);
2. Malaysia’s trajectory in the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index in the last 27 years which, if not reversed, will result in Malaysia becoming one of the most corrupt nations in Asia; and
3. The need for political and religious leaders to show good example in public integrity and anti-corruption.

There is no greater fillip to the new national anti-corruption campaign than for the Prime Minister to launch a clean-up of government-linked companies (GLCs) and government-linked investment companies (GLICs) by revealing in the July/August 2022 Parliament the salaries and allowances of all the heads of the GLCs and GLICs, whether 1MDB, Petronas, Khazanah, EPF, Permodalan Nasional Bhd (PNB), Lembaga Tabung Haji (LTH), Lembaga Tabung Angkatan Tentera (LTAT), Axiata Group Bhd, Telekom Malaysia Bhd., Tenaga Nasional Bhd, the National Trust Fund (KWAN), Kumpulan Wang Pesaraan (KWAP), the Ministry of Finance Inc (MoF Inc), Maybank, Sime Darby Bhd., CIMB Group Holdings, MISC Bhd, Proton Holdings or Malaysian Resources Corporation Bhd.

In August last year, the government launched Perkukuh with 20 initiatives to reform Malaysia’s GLCs and GLICs, but sorely lacking was the need to make the GLCs and GLICs models of accountability, transparency and public integrity, as the GLCs and GLICs had been corrupted by politicians.

Will the Barisan Nasional Members of Parliament from UMNO, MCA and MIC, under the leadership of the UMNO President, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, support such an anti-corruption campaign by Parliament?