Is it right to postpone Parliament?

While the political crisis coming from the fall of the Pakatan Harapan government is seemingly over, issues persist to challenge the current administration of the eighth Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.

The announcement of a two-month postponement of Parliament to May 18 has raised legal questions.

Lawyer and author, GK Genesan said the postponement is against the Standing Orders as Muhyiddin must comply with the notice period of 28 days as required under Order 11 (3).

“Order 11 of the Parliament states that the first sitting of each session will be held in a place and a date that the King has appointed. And then the leader of the House, which is the Prime Minister, may determine 28 days before the commencement, the dates on which the House shall meet," he says.

“These dates have been fixed earlier by Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad. When Muhyiddin took over, he made representation to the speaker that he wanted the dates moved back.

“I took issue with that because the 28-days notice had not been given,” said Ganesan via Skype on Astro AWANI talkshow, Consider This on Wednesday.

Parliament was previously slated to meet on March 9 prior to the collision of Pakatan Harapan government.

Ganesan viewed that Muhyiddin must act at least 28 days before the scheduled sitting. However, there were only eight days between March 1, when Muhyiddin took office as Prime Minister - and March 9, the scheduled sitting.

Therefore, under these circumstances, the Prime Minister did not give 28 days of notice and therefore cannot invoke Order 11.

On Monday, Dewan Rakyat Speaker Tan Sri Mohamad Ariff Md Yusof confirmed that the convening of Parliament had been postponed to May 18, following a letter of notification from Muhyiddin informing that the government has decided that the Third Term of the 14th Parliament has been deferred.

Based on the Federal Constitution, Parliament must meet within six months of the last sitting. The last meeting of the lower house of Parliament was the 2020 Budget sitting in October.

Pakatan Harapan has called for an emergency Parliament sitting to determine whether Muhyiddin has the numbers needed to secure the position of Prime Minister. Mahathir claims that Muhyiddin Yassin does not have majority support from the 222 Members of Parliament.

According to Ganesan, there are no legal remedies that can be taken by Pakatan Harapan to challenge the deferment.

“In the House, decisions by the Speaker shall not be called into question in any court, except if the Parliament itself makes a special motion to question the Speaker. In this case, there’s no one to question him now and he has made his decision. There’s nothing that can be done.

“He exercised his abilities and rights that he has under Order 29, 99A and 100 by which he can make these interpretations,” said Ganesan.

When asked if the Speaker might disallow a vote of no confidence in Parliament, expected to be brought upon by Pakatan Harapan against Muhyiddin, Ganesan said it is possible as decisions to allow or disallow a motion falls within the discretion of the Speaker.

“If the speaker feels that certain motions are not important, he may disallow the motions. The only way to challenge the speaker on the decision that he makes is to call for a separate motion to determine whether the speaker was right or not (in his decision),” he said.