Agora Society Statement on 12 December 2018
Agora Society is disappointed at the statement made by the current Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad at a local government event for insisting there would be no reinstatement of local elections under the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government. Local elections formed an integral component of Malaysia’s democracy until it was unceremoniously suspended in the 1965 and formally abolished with the passing of Local Government Act in 1976. By abolishing local elections, Malaysians are essentially being denied the right to vote for its local councillors which contradicts the principle of democracy. Therefore, Agora Society is of the view that local elections should be restored as soon as possible.
The Prime Minister reasoned that local elections may produce the wrong result which will create a division between urban and rural local councils. Firstly, Agora Society wishes to emphasize that a political mandate coming from a free and fair local elections would only lead to a democratic result which is certainly not wrong in any manner. In fact, local councillors that are elected through local elections would have more political legitimacy and accountability towards its voters unlike the appointed councillors Malaysia currently has now.
Also, the suggestion of an impending racial conflict due to local elections is baseless and could be easily refuted. Since 2008, Malaysians have had witnessed a change of state governments numerous times without descending to racial violence and the change of federal government from the most recent General Election further exemplifies Malaysian’s propensity towards accepting any election results without resorting to physical violence.
The newly appointed Deputy Minister of International Trade and MP of Bangi YB Ong Kian Ming has also correctly pointed out that the ethnic composition of urban city councils have changed significantly through an article dated 2015. For example, the 2010 census data shows that the Malay population (45.9%) within Kuala Lumpur City Hall is more than the Chinese population (43.2%). The Deputy Minister even proclaimed that out of the 3 city halls, 9 city councils and 37 municipal councils in Malaysia, only 6 have populations where the Chinese outnumber the Malays. This gives further credence to the argument that local elections might not produce an outcome where Chinese would occupy most of the local council seats in urban areas.
Agora Society was also aware that at the same event, the Prime Minister has also warned the local authorities not to simply abuse its power and even uttering the famous phrase 'power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely'. However, the local authorities in Malaysia would always be more susceptible to instances of corruption and abuse of power so long as local councillors are appointed by state government. The appointment system falls short of checking the decisions made by the local government as the only entity
that the local councillors are only accountable to are the governing parties of the state government. Therefore, if the Prime Minister is sincere in preventing corruption and abuse of power, he should immediately restore Malaysian’s long abandoned ‘third vote’.
Furthermore, Agora Society is also dismayed by the fact that strong advocates of local elections prior to the last General Election has seemingly turned a deaf ear or feeling indifferent towards the Prime Minister latest announcement. For instance, the aforementioned article written by YB Ong Kian Ming was actually a rebuttal towards Hadi Awang who has expressed similar racial concerns towards having local elections in Malaysia in 2015.
Other than that, the current Minister of Finance also had a history of trying to restore local elections through judiciary means when he was still the Chief Minister of Penang. In fact, the former Chief Minister of Penang used to explain that the state government is powerless to unilaterally push for local elections as long as the Local Government Act 1976 is not amended. Thus, with the change of federal government, PH has ran out of pretexts and advocates of local elections acting lukewarm towards this issue now is wholly unacceptable.
Equally, the Housing and Local Government Minister has also said that local elections will be implemented in 3 years. To sum up, there is no shortage of people in the PH’s cabinet that are supportive of the idea of reinstating local elections. Agora Society is concerned that the current Cabinet would bear no difference to the previous BN’s cabinet if the Prime Minister’s views are deemed to be final and not properly challenged within the cabinet or by the government backbenchers in the Parliament.
Finally, Agora Society also opposed to the idea that restoration of local elections to be deferred indefinitely because it was not stated as one of the promises from PH’s Manifesto. Agora Society ought to remind the PH government again such excuses are at best naive and at worst disingenuous. PH’s Manifesto has explicitly stated that Pakatan Harapan is committed to strengthen local democracy and the PBT’s accountability to the local community will be improved, and only by reinstating local elections where the local governments in Malaysia would have any semblance of local democracy and a certain degree of accountability. Therefore, until there is a proper local election in place, Malaysia will continue to have a local government that is not by the people or of the people.
Agora Society Malaysia
12.12.2018
*Agora Society Malaysia is a loose network of individuals who believe in the principles of democracy and good governance. More information please visit http://agoramalaysia.blogspot.com/ or http://www.facebook.com/agora.msia
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