The brewing constitutional crisis explained
KiniGuidePublished: Jul 31, 2021 10:13 AM | Updated: Jul 31, 2021 6:45 PM
- UPDATED 6.45PM: The last day of the special Dewan Rakyat sitting on Monday (Aug 2) has been postponed indefinitely after the PM applied for the postponement by citing Covid-19 risk.
KINIGUIDE | The tail end of Malaysia’s controversial 2021 emergency has been nothing short of dramatic.
First, a stunning royal rebuke over the emergency ordinances. Then, the prime minister’s insistence that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong has little choice but to revoke them as advised.
Some are now describing this as a constitutional crisis between the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and Istana Negara.
Here, Malaysiakini recapitulates what happened and sheds light on key questions involving the still-evolving situation...
We do not and cannot now know how this confrontation will end. But some things have become and been made clear. Among them an important one is this: That Malay royal power is at its greatest and most effective when the YDPA and Malay Rulers act not as "traditional Malay monarchs" -- as the inheritors and backward-looking latter-day upholders of ancient customary prerogatives -- but as the embodiment and personification, and as the guardians-of-last-resort, of modern national democratic constitutionalism.