JULY 15 — On 13 July 2020, the motion to remove Tan Sri Mohamad Ariff as Speaker of the House of Representatives was approved by Parliament with 111 MPs in favour and 109 against. The rough count of MPs' support for Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin is 113 while the Opposition bloc has 109 MPs to the difference of only four seats.

This session will also see an increase in the attendance record of MPs, especially the Cabinet and their deputies, to prevent the government from losing in the voting process. Opposition bloc MPs also need to have a full presence to pressure the government’s position on every motion.

This is a very critical situation for the Perikatan Nasional government (PN) which forms a minority government. To what extent will the PN government survive with a small majority? Will the PN government face a series of defeats in parliament?

When a minority government is formed, parliamentary institutions will indirectly become stronger and more effective. The PN government is not only facing tests from the opposition bloc, but also facing tests to ensure all government backbenchers support their proposals.

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Most likely the PN backbencher will rise and ‘rebel’ to reject the PN government's proposal given their internal politics, especially in the matter of seat distribution between Bersatu and Umno and the issues of nomination of a prime minister candidate should a snap election is called.

In the modern parliamentary era, the defeat of the government in parliament is a normal thing. For example, the United Kingdom (UK) minority government led by former UK Prime Minister Theresa May suffered 33 defeats in the House of Commons in the span of two years to approve a government proposal.

Another example is Australia, when the Australian minority government led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison lost in parliament to amend the Home Affairs Legislation Amendment (Miscellaneous Measures) Bill 2018. This is thGDR first time the Australian government has suffered a defeat in parliament since 1929.

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Hence, will this be a “new normal” of minority government in Malaysian politics and the government faces a possible defeat in parliament?

So far, the government has never lost to the opposition in bringing a motion or amendment to the bill in the Dewan Rakyat. However, both Barisan Nasional (BN) and Pakatan Harapan (PH) governments have had a hard time when a number of their proposals were almost defeated in the lower house.

On November 20, 2017, the Supply Bill of the Ministry of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism (KPDNKK) in 2018 Budget by BN was almost defeated by the opposition — with a result of 52 against 51 votes.

On 26 November 2019, the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development (KPWKM) Supply Bill for Budget 2019 under the PH government was also almost rejected by opposition MPs with the decision of 32 votes in favor and 28 against.

In fact, on 12 September 2018, the PH government lost in its effort to repeal the Anti-Fake News Bill (Repeal) 2018 when 28 Senators voted against the repeal of the bill, defeating 21 Senators who was in favour.

This incident has put the government in a critical situation in parliament. However, the pressure created by the opposition was an effective approach for the PH and BN governments to be more responsible for parliament in challenging times.

Thus, the PN minority government is expected to face the risk of losing in parliament if it does not get a strong support in parliament.

It may be a new scene to see the government lose in parliament for the future as the healthy competition of the country's elections since 2008 has made it difficult for political parties to form a government with a two-thirds majority, and win a landslide majority at every general election.

Co-governing as the way forward

Like it or not, a minority government like PN need the support of opposition MPs to ensure the government's motion is approved by parliament. This is an initial step to reduce the risk of defeat if any government MPs reject the government's own motion.

The PN government cannot rely on old methods such as PH and BN coalition in the parliament to ensure success in any debate or motion. They need to use the concept of co-govern of parliament-executive to ensure the stability of the government. The Cabinet should provide space for MPs to cooperate in the process of formulating government policies through parliamentary institutions such as select committees. 

This method will provide an opportunity for Opposition and backbencher MPs to be involved in the process of making national policies and amending government bills. It is also a way for the government to get strong support in parliament despite having a relatively small majority.

In fact, the concept of co-governing will be an important approach to the governance of the country in the future as it is nearly impossible now to form a two-thirds majority to gain support as a federal government due to intense election competition. In the context of the PN government today, the approach of co-governing will help them create a stable government that PN seeks for in parliament provided the MPs trust the parliament to function well as an effective check and balance.

However, looking at parliament’s proceedings recently, there was a hint that the PN government will somehow sideline the parliament’s role to function effectively. Hence, unless there is a political will and maturity by PN to display their characteristics of a true “people’s first government” that the portray themselves to be, it will be some time until the PN government adopt the co-governing approach that the author believes is the best approach to effective governance today.

* Fakhrurrazi Rashid is research coordinator for Malaysian think tank Research for Social Advancement (Refsa).

** This is the personal opinion of the writer(s) or organisation(s) and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.