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PETALING JAYA: Tun Dr Mahathir MohamadPhoto) says that any decision to declare a state of emergency in the country will be only for political reasons.
“Faced with the possibility of being overthrown, the Prime Minister wants the powers in a state of emergency.
“The only benefit would be for the Prime Minister, as Parliament would be paralyzed.
“An emergency would give the prime minister more power,” the former prime minister said in a blog post yesterday.
Dr. Mahathir, who is the chairman of Parti Pejuang Tanah Air, said that the Covid-19 pandemic had been used to justify Parliament delaying, shortening and leaving without debate.
“Now it is to justify declaring a state of emergency. But the power and authority of the current government have been adequate to deal with the pandemic.
“What can (a state of) emergency do to stop the pandemic more than we can do now? Nothing, ”he wrote.
He said that speculation had created ripples in the national economy, and that the stock market was hit hard.
Gua Musang MP Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah said the state of emergency could be “the last nail in the coffin” for the economy.
“If the prime minister were to get away with imposing the proposed state of emergency, as an economist myself and being a former finance minister and a former minister of international trade and industry, I can say with some certainty that he may be the last nail in the coffin of our already battered economy, ”he said in a statement.
Tengku Razaleigh said he was not questioning the prime minister’s right to request a declaration of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong state of emergency, but rather the basis, justification, timing and actual motive for it.
“We are having a public health crisis that is severely affecting the livelihoods and economy of our people, and the government may not be handling the crisis in the best interest of the public.
“The public and politicians on the other side of the divide, with the exception of a few die-hard, are cooperating with the government on measures and standard operating procedures.
“I don’t see any honest basis for such a request.
“I can only suspect non-honorable motives behind this,” said Tengku Razaleigh.
Former Minister Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz described the government’s intention to declare a state of emergency as “putting politics before principles, ethics and the national interest.”
“The economic and socioeconomic impact on the people and the nation continues to sap all our resilience and confidence.
“But declaring an Emergency, impacting Parliament, democratic processes and dispensing with democratic norms, that’s too much,” he said yesterday in a Facebook post.
Former Attorney General Tan Sri Tommy Thomas said that proclaiming a state of emergency to handle the Covid-19 pandemic would be unconstitutional.
“Covid-19 has been with us since January. On a comparative and relative scale, Malaysia has handled the pandemic well.
“The government cannot then claim that Covid-19 has become so ‘threatening’ overnight that we have a serious emergency,” he said in a statement.
Thomas said it was impossible for the prime minister to argue that national security was affected in any way if he continued in office.
“Also, public order. That leaves the economic life. This precondition does not apply. In these circumstances, today there are no legal bases for the proclamation of Emergency in Malaysia, ”he added.
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