Rafidah should quit, says Shahrir
Datuk Seri Rafidah Aziz should quit if she cannot work with the Prime Minister and her Cabinet colleagues, said Government Backbenchers Club chairman Datuk Shahrir Abdul Samad.
“The Prime Minister says to work with him. And if Rafidah cannot work with Pak Lah and the Cabinet, she should do the honourable thing. Resign. She is happily challenging the Cabinet on a matter that she was part of."
“She had her say but the Cabinet has decided the other way,” the Johor Baru MP said, in response to remarks by the International Trade and Industry Minister on Friday that the Approved Permits (APs) to import cars should be abolished.
Shahrir said Rafidah’s statement showed disrespect to Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and the Cabinet, which recently decided to form a special committee headed by the Prime Minister to review and decide on the AP issue and the national automotive policy.
Questioning her right to suggest the abolition of the APs since the matter was no longer under her ministry’s purview, Shahrir said: “It is the wrong thing to say. It is irresponsible. As a senior minister, she should know very well not to comment on a matter that is outside her portfolio. It does not matter if she was upset or if she thinks she has been badly treated. She should respect the decision made by Abdullah and the Cabinet,” said Shahrir, adding that after her fallout with former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad she was now showing disrespect to the present Prime Minister.
“We look forward to her joining the backbenchers,” he quipped.
In Shah Alam, JANE RITIKOS reported Abdullah as saying that Rafidah’s suggestion regarding the APs were her personal views.
“It is her personal view so I will not take it into consideration,” he told reporters yesterday.
COMMENTS:
Shahrir had posed the question: "What RIGHT Rafidah has to suggest the abolition of the APs since the matter is no longer under her purview?"
If that's the case, it is ironical that he was also questioning Rafidah's rights when it (the APs) was under her purview?
First at foremost; was there a gag order by the PM? If there is, then Rafidah may have violated the Ministerial convention. However, it must be noted that convention is a practice and not a rule of law. In similarity, when the APs were issued by the Minister, and impliedly or "ignorantly" agreed or consented by the Prime Ministers, it must therefore be respected by the Cabinet and their colleagues within the National Front government. At such, those hoo-ha and Incendiary attack from within is a gross contempt of Parliament. If such a policy is an egregious mistake, then the Cabinet as a whole is fully responsible and by convention, they too must resign and that of course include Rafidah.
The system should in fact have Scrutinising Body or Ombudsmen to address any of these shortcomings, instead of pouring their diatribes via the public media and at the UMNO convention. All Prime Minister who had allowed the AP system to function as it was, for so many years, cannot by their own convenience claimed that they did not know that such things existed. This is sacrilegious.
The next poser by Shahrir is: "She cannot work with the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, she should do the honourable thing. Resign. She is happily challenging the Cabinet on a matter that she was part of."
I don't think she is happily challenging the Cabinet or the PM. She is merely pouring her chagrin to express her contention to those who had violently pursuit her on the subject matter.
The fact remains unchallenged that over the years when she was the power behind the issue of APs, many MPs and UMNO members had ingratiated themselves with her, seeking favors and getting APs for themselves and their family members - these by itself are larcenous acts if we construed her act as larceny. Now they who had benefitted, and had turned their back and are distancing themselves so as to come clean and participate in liaty with the public outcry, and those who had curried her favor had turned on against her to show their new alignment to the anointed Oligarchy.
To sum up, she is wrong; the system is "the wrong", the leader is accountable and fully responsible to right it. By convention, she may have to resign but her resignation would not spell the end of the excesses. In fact, it signify the beginning of a behemoth; a new colossal profligation under the Avaricious genus and his Acolyte.
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