No PM's Question Time is a 'great disappointment' - PKR lawmaker

Subang MP Wong Chen has expressed disappointment with de facto Law Minister Liew Vui Keong’s statement that there is no need to implement a Prime Minister’s Question Time (PMQT) in Parliament.

He said the PMQT was meant to be a legitimate platform for MPs to question the prime minister, who is otherwise not compelled to answer questions in the Dewan Rakyat.

This is intended as an alternative tool for check-and-balance, in lieu of a parliamentary select committee, since there is no select committee to monitor the Prime Minister’s Office under the Westminster parliamentary model, Wong (photo, above) said.

"The news that the prime minister is now unwilling to have PMQT is a great disappointment. This is yet another U-turn on our reform manifesto.

“The whole point of having PMQT is to make the prime minister more responsive and accountable.

“As it is, the prime minister’s powers in our Malaysian-style 'democracy' are extremely wide and unusual,” he said in a Facebook posting yesterday.

Najib 'hardly ever attended' Parliament

Wong added that former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak had hardly ever attended Parliament, much less answer MPs’ questions.

He said such impunity had allowed the 1MDB scandal, and Malaysia cannot “go back to those opaque and super corrupt days”.

In contrast, in the UK, he said, the opposition leader would have been guaranteed six questions to the prime minister.

Yesterday, Liew had said there is no need for PMQT as there is already a Ministers’ Question Time (MQT).

“So, I think for now we don’t need a PMQT yet. In time, should the need arise, then we can probably consider that. For now, the MQT is sufficient,” he said.

This is despite Promise 16 in Pakatan Harapan’s election manifesto promising 30 minutes of PMQT during each week of the Dewan Rakyat sittings.