Sultan's private secretary misleading the people

Legal experts disputed today the Selangor palace’s claim over executive power, declaring that it is the Menteri Besar — and not the Sultan — who is the state’s chief executive.

They claimed that in the Sultan’s role as the constitutional monarch, the Ruler should be viewed as a “figure of unity” and any attempt by him to wade into state administrative matters could be misconstrued as a political move.

Lawyer Chan Kok Keong said that the Sultan had no executive power and maintained that the mentri besar was the prime authority in any matter concerning the state administration.

Chan's statement was also later affirmed by a constitutional expert, Abdul Aziz Bari in his latest statement today afternoon.

Therefore, what has been claimed by the Sultan's private secretary Datuk Mohamad Munir Bani that the Sultan of Selangor is the state's chief executive was baseless and aimed at misleading the people and the entire nation.

Again, we want to affirm that not only the Sultan of Selangor, but also the Sultans in the other states only perform their functions and duties as constitutional monarch with no executive powers. The real executive powers are in fact lies in the hand of the Menteris Besar of the respective states.

This same situation also goes to those state whose head of state are Yang Dipertua Negeri (Governor) where the executive powers are in the hands of the respective chief ministers of those states.

In this case, Datuk Munir had misused his role as the private secretary in misleading the people of Selangor and the entire nation in particular by stating that the Sultanate holds the actual executive power in the state.

As the result of the misleading statement, numerous misinformed people and extremist NGOs has came out in violent protests against the Selangor state government deliberately accusing the administration of trying to bring down the ruler.

In one occasion Zaini Hassan, an editor of the Utusan Malaysia press even wrote a racist article in their newspaper claiming that Selangor is risk turning into a Chinese state like Singapore and even stated the possibility of an interference from the Chinese government. All these does not make any sense at all.

It clearly shows that these ultra-right racist Umno and NGO leadersas well as their press are trying to create more hatred and chaos in the state. What is the police doing? Still standing there and watch?

As such, Datuk Munir should come forward and apologize to the people as well as the entire nation and to immediately withdraw his misleading statement as soon as possible. Look at the situation which he had created. Destabilizing the state and creating disunity among the people there.

On the other hand, just look at Umno and its sponsored NGOs, like Perkasa and GAP are making full use of this unwarranted situation by calling those who question the Sultan's statement (actually, it was the private secretary who made all those statements) to be put to death.

Umno, Perkasa and GAP are encouraging such an uncivilized manner and act to be performed. We must remember that Malaysia is a democratic nation and we should reject these sorts of violent and hate currently currently being advanced by Umno, Perkasa and GAP.

By the way, is this the kind of 1Malaysia that Umno and BN is advocating all this while?