Is it time to do away with the Senate?

ARCHIVES 2013

By admin-s On May 23, 2013

(fz.com) – The real function of the Senate is being questioned. While it was established and inherited by the British to safeguard law making, has it now turned into a ‘back-door’ appointment tool for Cabinet positions and is it still relevant?

IN DECEMBER 1997, an unusual outcry arose from the normally placid Senate or Dewan Negara when its members reacted to a dismissive label given to the Upper House by the then parliamentary opposition leader Lim Kit Siang – he had called it a “rubber-stamp to a rubber-stamp.”

As senators mostly appointed under the Barisan Nasional (BN) government angrily remonstrated, Lim insisted that he was vindicated in making the ignominious reference. For the Senate had, on Dec 22, passed an important amendment, in the form of the Criminal Procedure Amendment Bill 1997 – without any debate whatsoever.

The Senate, he added, was a “rubbish bin for political has-beens, rejects and deadwoods”, and one way to remedy the situation was to replace the appointive system with an elective one.

“This move would involve sacrifices by the Senators as I do not think many, even any, of them could get into the Dewan Negara if they have first to seek the mandate from the people at large,” the DAP secretary-general and MP for Tanjung said.

The issue surrounding the Senate’s purported inefficacy was not just based on the seeming absence of strong, daring debates. Because the Malaysian Senate had been almost entirely dominated by the BN and its predecessor, the Alliance, since independence in 1957, there was a general view that the senators did not do enough to positively counter the government of the day.

A tool for “back-door” appointments

The question of the Senate’s relevance emerged again recently when Lim’s long-time comrade-in-arms, Karpal Singh, who is now DAP chairman and Bukit Gelugor MP, opined that the Senate should be abolished altogether.

It has produced a backlash reminiscent of the uproar that Lim had generated in 1997, with current Dewan Negara President Tan Sri Abu Zahar Ujang rebuking Karpal to “respect the rule of law and our constitution.”

The issue had resurfaced when Karpal told a press conference in Penang last Saturday that there is no need for the Senate. “In my view, the Federal Constitution should be amended to abolish the senate,” he said.

“It is an unnecessary expense required to be borne by the people. It does not serve a useful purpose,” he added. “It only encourages those who have been rejected by the people or others to be brought into Parliament through the back door via the Senate, as in law Parliament also includes the Senate.”