LEMBUcracy vs Democracy

This article is contributed by Steven Chen Lee, my fellow
East-West Center alumnus

Is our present Parliament a cow shed or is it an epitome of democracy? If it is to be the latter then our parliamentary system must change. All voting in Parliament especially on major issues must be by secret balloting instead of by show of hands or shouting of ayes. Only then can our MP’s vote with their conscience without fear or favor. They can vote according to what they perceived their constituents want and NOT what the PM/CM/MB wants. Our MP’s must be reminded that they are in the august house as the people’s representatives and NOT the PM’s or the Party’s representatives.

Although our parliamentary system is modeled after the U.K. Westminister’s system, it is still not perfect. There are ample rooms for improvement. The West still can learn from the East for true democracy. The Parliaments of Malaysia, U.K. and the Commonwealth countries are like slave galleys with the Party whip as the slave masters. The whips can dictate how the MP’s / ADUN’s vote. This is made worse when the ruling Party has more than 2/3 majority or when the people voted along the Party line like in Malaysia instead of voting for the individuals. Here like in the past before the 2008 general election the ruling Party (BN) which translated to the PM ruled supreme. The PM can dictate and cow Parliament into submission by threatening the MP’s with dismissals from the cabinet or other governmental positions. Worse he can drop them in the next coming election by not nominating them to contest. This way the MP’s have to toe the PM’s line all the time and behaved like cows or yes-men of the PM in the Parliament. Our MP’s / ADUN’s were being led by the nose like cows in the Parliament and the state assemblies respectively. Hence we have LEMBUcracy rather than democracy in our parliamentary system.

To aggravate the matter Malaysian voters tend to vote along the Party line rather than voting for the individual candidate based on the candidate’s own capability. The voters voted for the Party rather than for the individual candidate. So if a popular Party were to nominate even a monkey to contest under its’ ticket the useless monkey (candidate) would still win because the people voted for the Party regardless of the capability of the candidate.

During the time of Aristotle the councilors or senators could debate, discuss and voted freely in the council house or the senate. There was no Party whip to dictate to them on what to say or how to vote. There was true democracy then. Our parliament should be in this state of affairs where our MP’s can debate and vote freely with their conscience and without fear or favour with no one to dictate to them.

In the previous Penang state assembly where the two state assembly men (ADUN ) voted against the CM’s proposal to implement the PORR project and they were sanctioned and suspended from the Party for that. They had to sit with the opposition bench. At that time the ruling BN party was controlling more than 80% of the seats/ votes in the state assembly. Therefore the two dissenting votes were not even crucial or critical to the government. Instead the two ADUN’s merely wanted to register the displeasure of their constituents against the project. They were only carrying out their responsibilities and duties to their voters as expected of them. Instead the then CM wanted to fool the people into thinking that the state’s PORR project had the full and majority supports of the people when the truth was the people were against it.

What Pak Lah should do before leaving his office (Premiership) is to institute a parliamentary reform by introducing secret balloting in our Malaysian parliament. This form of voting is more dignified rather than the thumping of tables like school children. Let this be his legacy as the Premier who brought true democracy into the Malaysian parliament as well as the British , the Commonwealth and the world parliaments. I am sure all the MP’s in the world would want freedom to choose and to vote independently without any constrains according to their conscience.
Ps.
I will elaborate more on the OSA where the MP’s had to vote against their will during the discussion.