Right time to enact Anti-Hop Law: Pairin
KOTA KINABALU, Jan 30 (The Borneo Post)
-- Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Seri Joseph Pairin Kitingan
said the time was ripe to amend the Federal Constitution
for the enactment of a law to stop politicians from changing
parties after being elected to parliament or state assemblies.
“We have seen enough political instability in the past.
It is time to give this proposal its due merit and approval.
“By having Anti-Hop Law provisions in the constitution,
we would add another significant milestone in the stability
of our social and political landscape,” he said in a statement
here yesterday. Pairin, who is also Parti Bersatu Sabah
(PBS) president, said he would support “all those who are
advocating to propose this amendment to the Federal and
State constitutions”.
He was commenting on Umno Supreme Council (MT) member Datuk
Seri Dr Rais Yatim’s statement on Wednesday who asked the
Perak Barisan Nasional (BN) to organise a mass movement
to demand that Bota assemblyman Datuk Nasaruddin Hashim
give up the seat to enable a by-election as he had chosen
to cross over to Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR).
Rais, who is also foreign minister, had said Nasaruddin
won the seat on the BN ticket in the general election and
by deserting the coalition, he had betrayed the trust of
the people.
He said debate on the proposed Anti-Hop Law should be brought
to a conclusion so that political stability based on honesty
and sincerity in joining a political party and the social
contract between the voters and the candidate could be properly
crystallised.
“This will justify the placement of the Anti-Hop Law in
the constitution both at the Federal and State-levels. I
believe it is now an appropriate time to push this Anti-Hop
Law through Parliament,” he said.
The then-PBS government enacted such a law in the 1980’s
but was later declared ultra vires the Federal Constitution
as it restrained one’s freedom of association.
Consequently, the constitutional freedom denied PBS, then
an opposition party in 1994, the right to bring action against
the majority of PBS assemblymen who switched over to the
BN after winning in the ninth general election.
The mass defection caused the fourth-term PBS government
to last only two weeks before it was forced out of power.
