Putrajaya agrees to put emergency ordinances to debate

Putrajaya has agreed to table a motion on revoking the emergency ordinances, allowing a debate by MPs in line with a call by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong.

Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said the Cabinet will discuss the motion tomorrow, and expressed hope that it would resolve the stalemate over the revocation of emergency ordinances “in a harmonious and constitutional manner”.

He said the motion would be tabled during the September sitting of the Dewan Rakyat.

He added that the move to revoke the emergency ordinances through the advice of the Cabinet to the Agong on July 23 could not be completed.

In January, the Agong consented to declare a virus emergency which saw the suspension of parliamentary and state assembly sittings.

The emergency expired on Aug 1.

“With the end of the proclamation of emergency on Aug 1, based on the provisions of the Federal Constitution, the question of revoking the emergency ordinances by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong no longer arises,” Muhyiddin added.

On July 29, Istana Negara said the government’s move to revoke the emergency ordinances, announced in the Dewan Rakyat three days earlier, had not received royal consent.

Law minister Takiyuddin Hassan had said in the Dewan Rakyat on July 26 that the government would not advise the Agong to extend the state of emergency upon its expiry on Aug 1.

He also said the government had decided based on Article 105(3) to revoke all emergency ordinances made during the emergency period.

But the palace said what had been consented to and decreed to Takiyuddin as minister in charge of law and Idrus Harun as attorney-general during a virtual audience on July 24 that the proposal to revoke all emergency ordinances be tabled and debated in Parliament for the purpose of annulment was not carried out.

It also said that Takiyuddin’s statement was inaccurate and had confused the MPs.

Muhyiddin later said that the government had followed all constitutional procedures and provisions before announcing the revocation of emergency ordinances.