DAP will be de facto ‘prime minister’ if opposition wins
(Tanjak) – There is no need for DAP to become prime minister de jure. It suffices for them that DAP is the de facto power. A quick glance around the world shows how this can be done.
Aung San Suu Kyi is the state counsellor of Myanmar. She would have been president if not for the legal roadblock that prevents her from taking the job.
Myanmar has a law that prevents an individual from becoming the president if his/her spouse or children are foreign nationals. This provision in the law inserted by the military junta seems expressly targeted to disqualify Suu Kyi as her late husband and sons are British citizens.
Suu Kyi’s party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), emphatically won Myanmar’s election in November 2015. As the NLD chief, she is her country’s foremost civilian leader.
But since Suu Kyi is barred from rightfully assuming the presidency, a new official post called ‘state counsellor’ had to be specially created for her. It’s a government position that is in substance more powerful than the job designation of ‘president’ which, in name, is being held presently by Htin Kyaw(pix below).
President vs Prime Minister in republics
Depending on which country, it can be the president or the prime minister who is the more powerful.
In India the PM is more powerful than the president. Think Narendra Modi vis-à-vis Pranab Mukherjee.
Similarly Singapoe. Yusof Ishak was the first president of Singapore. During the period that Yusof served as president from 1965 to 1970, his prime minister was Lee Kuan Yew. Appointing a Malay as the island republic’s head of state was a piece of tokenism to appease the Singapore Malays. Everyone knew that Lee was the boss.
In Singapore, the prime minister rules whereas the president is fulfilling a largely ceremonial role. Perhaps more uniquely in Singapore, the senior Lee was still a ‘minister mentor’ in the cabinet of his son PM Lee Hsien Loong and only finally retired from cabinet in 2011 at the ripe old age of 88.
What was the most powerful cabinet position?
