LETTERS: I refer to the New Straits Times' Leader, "It's PM's prerogative" (Sept 19). It is mind-boggling that people are demanding that Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob fix a date for the general election.

After all, the Meteorological Department has warned that the public should prepare for floods during the northeast monsoon, which is expected to begin in November.

Should a general election be held during the flood season?

Communications and Multimedia Minister Tan Sri Annuar Musa said that if a general election were to be held "in an atmosphere that is not conducive for people to go out to vote, voter turnout would be low."  

That aside, as rightly highlighted by the Leader, the call for a general election is the prime minister's prerogative.

Plus, dissolving Parliament is not done simply by the prime minister making a request to Yang di-Pertuan Agong Al-Sultan Abdullah Ri'ayatuddin Al-Mustafa Billah Shah.

Article 40(2) of the Constitution allows the king to exercise his discretion in (a) the appointment of a prime minister; (b) the withholding of consent to a request for the dissolution of Parliament; and (c) the requisition of a meeting of the Conference of Rulers concerned solely with the privileges, position, honour and dignity of their royal highnesses and any action at such a meeting, and in any other case mentioned in the Constitution.

Otherwise, the king, being a constitutional monarch, acts on the advice of the cabinet.

Even so, there is a view that the king has "residual discretion", allowing His Majesty to act not in accordance with the advice of the cabinet.

It is said that there is nothing in Article 40(1) or (1A) of the constitution, providing for the king to act on advice, to cast aside this residual discretion.

This residual discretion can be seen when the king refused to accede to the request of then prime minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to declare a nationwide emergency in October 2020.

The king's refusal would seem to fly in the face of the Privy Council decision in Teh Cheng Poh v PP (1979) that the king's functions "are those of a constitutional monarch and he does not exercise any of his functions under the constitution on his own initiative but is required by Article 40(1) to act in accordance with the advice of the cabinet".

Among the country's constitutional experts, the decision by the king to refuse the advice to proclaim an emergency has a "sound constitutional basis".

The country's leading constitutional expert, Professor Emeritus Datuk Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi, has said that "in addition to the constitutionally conferred discretionary powers mentioned in Article 40(2), there are probably other instances in which residual, reserve, prerogative and inherent powers of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong may come into play".

Shad said life is larger than law and no constitution is exhaustive or can anticipate every contingency.

The late Sultan Azlan Shah captured this when he wrote in 1986: "A king is a king, whether he is an absolute or a constitutional monarch... It is a mistake to think that the role of a king is confined to what is laid down by the constitution. His role far exceeds those constitutional provisions."

So, if a king is a king and has residual, reserve and inherent powers, where the king has a discretion conferred by the constitution itself, why the demand for an immediate general election?

HAFIZ HASSAN

Bukit Baru, Melaka

https://www.nst.com.my/opinion/letters/2022/09/833575/its-pm-king