Pakatan promises slew of reforms
DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng says if Pakatan comes to power, key institutions like the judiciary will not face government interference.
Athi Shankar, FMT
Pakatan Rakyat’s election promise is that it will free key institutions from government interference.
DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said some of these institutions are the judiciary, the Attorney General’s Chambers, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and police.
He said if Pakatan comes into power he promised reforms to restore integrity and independence to these institutions.
Under Pakatan, he said heads of these institutions would be appointed through an advisory process by parliamentary working committees in line with legislature and democratic practices.
He said the reform agenda for the institutions formed an integral part of the Pakatan election manifesto launched on Feb 5.
He also revealed that Pakatan would enforce a Democracy Restoration Act as part of a process to reverse the many years of democratic rot and neglect under the 56 year Barisan Nasional reign.
He pointed out that many current Pakatan leaders had suffered personally and professionally under the BN government.
He said that BN had blatantly abused power and misused various state instruments to target and victimise its political opponents.
“Given these personal experiences, including my own, I would not want the same instruments to be used against our political opponents when we come to power at the federal level.
“Therefore, it is imperative that Pakatan pushes forward aggressively on these electoral and democratic reforms when the goal of winning Putrajaya has been achieved, hopefully in the upcoming 13th general election,” Lim said in a blog posting.
He assured that an effective parliamentary system would be reinforced to check and balance the executive.
