Lo: ‘Mother of all motions’ in accordance with law

1

Lo delivers his secretary general report at the conference. — Photo by Kong Jun Liung

KUCHING: The ministerial motion moved by Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh on Friday to disqualify Dr Ting Tiong Choon as Pujut assemblyman has been described as ‘the mother of all motions’.

United People’s Party (UPP) secretary-general George Lo said party president Wong and deputy president Datuk Dr Jerip Susil had to move and second the motion in the State Legislative Assembly (DUN) because “the State Constitution was breached.”

“It is the first motion of its kind in Sarawak history… I believe that the motion that was moved by our president and seconded by our deputy president in the Dewan was properly done. That motion has been described by other Barisan Nasional (BN) assemblymen as the mother of all motions.

“It was done in accordance with the law. It was the right thing to do. There was a breach of the State Constitution and as soon as our president and deputy president knew about it, they had that duty to move that motion,” he said at the party’s Extraordinary Delegates Conference held at the KTS Garden here yesterday.

Lo stressed that Wong, who is Minister of International Trade and E-Commerce and Dr Jerip, who is Assistant Minister for Transportation, “could not knowingly stand by and do nothing if they knew that the constitution of the state had been breached.”

“Much has been said in the social media since yesterday (Friday) about the legality of the disqualification of Dr Ting. I’d like to inform members in my capacity as secretary general and practising lawyer why Dr Ting was disqualified.”

Lo read out Article 16 of the State Constitution: “Every citizen of or over the age of 21 years who is resident in the State is qualified to be elected as an elected member of the DUN, unless he is disqualified for being such a member by the Federal Constitution or this Constitution or by any such law as is mentioned in Article 17.”

He pointed out that Article 17(1)(g) was the provision of law that Dr Ting was disqualified under.

“Article 17(1)(g) of the State Constitution states that subject to the provisions of this Article, a person is disqualified for being elected as an elected member of the DUN, if under paragraph (g) he has voluntarily acquired citizenship of, or exercised rights of citizenship in, any country outside the Federation of Malaysia or has made a declaration of allegiance to any country outside the Federation.

“Article 18(2) says that an elected member shall also vacate his seat in the dewan if he ceases to be qualified for election as such a member of the dewan. So if he has breached Article 17(1)(g) by taking citizenship in another country, then he is no longer qualified and ceases to be qualified for election to the DUN.

“Article 19(1) says that if any question arises whether the Speaker or a member of the DUN has ceased to be qualified for appointment or election as such, the decision of the dewan shall be taken and shall be final,” pointed out Lo.

He said Dr Ting had admitted or at least had not denied that he took citizenship in Australia.

“But apparently he renounced the citizenship in April 2016, just before the state election. Now why did he do that? Why did he renounce the Australian citizenship?

“It is obvious that he renounced it because he knew that by virtue of being a citizen of Australia, he is disqualified from standing for election, if he holds dual citizenships.”

Lo said it was safe to assume that the DAP must have known of the scenario as he believed that it was quite impossible that Dr Ting held back the information.

“It was therefore not prudent of DAP to field a candidate in breach of the State Constitution.

“It (DAP) must have known that he (Dr Ting) was not qualified but they chose to take the chance to field an unqualified candidate, and that has backfired upon them.

“There was also mention that they might take the matter to court. As I read to you, Article 19, the decision of the Dewan is final. So the court is unlikely to disturb the decision or quash the decision of the Dewan.

“But even if the court wishes to look into the decision, I’d say the decision was made in accordance with the State Constitution because of the fact that Dr Ting had taken citizenship in Australia.

“The State Constitution did not say that if you renounced it, that would be fine. It says that if you have at any stage taken citizenship of another country, you are disqualified. And he did take (Australian) citizenship,” added Lo.

He said when someone took up citizenship of a country the person had to take an oath of allegiance to that nation.

He said pledging allegiance to another country was another breach of the constitution.

Now that the Pujut seat is vacant, Lo called upon the party to gear up for the by-election.

“I believe in all likelihood, a by-election will be called for Pujut. Pujut is a seat that was allocated to UPP to contest in last state election. And therefore, UPP must be fully prepared in the event that the by-election is called.”