Following the Saturday Night Massacre of the incumbent Barisan Nasional coalition at the country’s polls on 8 March, the whole country seemed to be in a seismic state of shock as banner headlines were incessantly screaming, “Tsunami Hits Five States!”

When natural disasters like this strike, it leaves behind a trail of carnage and scores and scores of victims so traumatised that they who do not know what has hit them. What is more disastrous is that such loss are not insurable. Underwriters call this phenomenon an “act of God” not so much they are conscious of the awesome power of God but they find this a convenient excuse to avoid paying huge compensation.

Likewise, political risks are not insurable. Even when there is the slightest of movements along the political fault lines, the seismic shock and subsequent loss are unfathomable. So was the political tsunami on 8 March an act of God? To those who were swept into power by the tidal wave in Kedah, Penang, Perak, and Selangor, it certainly looked like they are blessed by an act of God. How else can we explain away what the pundits say can never happen? But can we also say the same for those who were swept out of power are cursed by act of God?

Just like in the tsunami that hit Penang in Christmas of 2004, the great fear then was that a second tidal wave may hit us. The same uncertainty lurks in our minds surely. The second wave actually did hit; the fall of all but one parliamentary seats in the Kuala Lumpur Federal Territory and also the squabbles in Perak, Perlis and Terengganu about who should be the respective Mentris Besar.

Whatever has happened, it looks like we are now we are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Worst still, we have no precedents to fall back on because over the last 50 years of parliamentary elections in the country, this has never happened before.

Things will never be the same again. Things are already so different. We have to get use to new ways of looking at politics and we might as well brace ourselves for a fundamental realignment of power in the political landscape of Malaysia. Old ways are not going to work anymore. If our thinking does not change radically now, we will be consigned to the dustbin of history. At best we will be mere footnotes of what happened on the Saturday Night Massacre.

For a start, we have to get use to speaking a new language. Whereas in the past, politics was very simplistic. It’s either the Government or the Opposition. An superficial dichotomy that conceals our lack of understanding of what a constitutional monarchy is all about. Government means the Barisan Nasional coalition of 14 component parties. Opposition means DAP, the largely Chinese-based party, PAS, the Islamic party, a few other minor parties that we hardly know of their existence except for the fact that they surface once every five years to offer themselves as candidates, plus a ragtag collection of independent candidates.

In the past, we call Lim Kit Siang, a founding leader of the Democratic Action Party, Opposition Leader of the Lower House in Parliament. Actually his title is, “Leader of His Majesty Loyal Opposition” whose duty is to oppose “His Majesty’s Government.” So the DAP is nothing more than an “opposition party”.

But after 8 March, the DAP together with its allies notably Parti Keadilan Rakyat and PAS have gained control of four state governments in Penang, Perak, Kedah, Selangor and the KL Federal Territory, while the fifth state, Kelantan is retained by PAS.

So now in Penang, Lim Guan Eng, son of the senior Lim is now Chief Minister and at the same time he is an Opposition MP in the Dewan Rakyat. Many in DAP, PAS and PKR have stood and won both state and parliamentary seats. So at the state levels, they are the government but at the Federal level, they are the Opposition. Is this going to turn out to be a political schizophrenia?

The two-third majority stranglehold of Barisan has been finally broken at this polls. They are now in power with a simple majority. With one more tsunami, the government may be just swept out of power. Anwar Ibrahim, the deputy Prime Minister who was sacked and disgraced by Mahathir and is now the de facto leader of the PKR, is annoyed when reporters continue to call his coalition with DAP and PAS as the Opposition.

“We are the government-in-waiting, “he corrected them. Of course, he need not have to say he is the Prime Minister-in-waiting. Or the Pretender-to-the-throne. Other new words we need to get used to are “Shadow government, shadow Cabinet, shadow Front bench.”

What this means is that for the first time in our history we are beginning to see a two-party system; one in power, the other in the shadow waiting to come into the spotlight.

We have to get used to how we use our honorifics, like YAB and YB which is akin to the Rt Hon, is Englsih speaking Commonwealth parliaments. The YB’s are of course the Yang Berhormat’s that all MPs and state assemblypersons are called but the YAB is reserved only for the Prime Minister, his deputy and the heads of all state governments. The extra A stands for “Amat” so the Rt Hon becomes the “Very” Rt Hon.

This is going to be hard getting used to as in our history the YAB can only be used by the Barisan leaders. In the rare occasions where they lose the state governments like in Kelantan, the “Opposition” is entitled to use it. But at the Federal level, the YAB has thus far been the monopoly of the Barisan.

Now this YB and YAB is getting troublesome. Imagine when Lim Guan Eng meets his father Lim Kit Siang in the Parliament House, the senior Lim is obliged to address his son as YAB since the young Lim is the Chief Minister in Penang. And what will his wife, Betty Chew, the assemblywoman for Kota Laksamana in Malacca, address? My dear or My YAB? Oh! dear it’s getting confusing.

With the high drama in Perak, Perlis and Terengganu over the appointments of their respective mentris besar, the monarchy has suddenly taken on a new meaning. When the Regent of Perak Raja Nazrin Shah in a recent speech pointed out that in Malaysia’s constitutional monarchy, the sultans’ roles is more than merely ceremonial, no one really paid any particular attention. Or cared.

But after the 8 march tsunami, the meaning of his utterances became crystal clear. The sultans are above politics but when politicians are unable to resolve their political infighting, then the sultans can, and as these cases have shown, step in resolve the impasse.

In the case of Perak where the DAP-PKR-PAS pack won with 31 of the 59 state seats in the Perak Legislative Assembly, the choice of MB need not have to depend on the component party with the most number of seats, in this case DAP. So the Palace withheld consent until they sort out the confusion among themselves.

In Perlis and Terengganu, although UMNO won with more than comfortable majorities, the Prime Minister who is also UMNO president did not have the final say.

As in a tsunami of 2004, when the tidal wave retreats, the survivors have to bury the dead and heal the wounded. We need to assess the damage. More importantly, we also need to put in place an early monitoring and warning system to warn us of flaws in our constitutional monarchy before the next general elections in 2012. Should another tsunami hit, we will at least be more prepared for it. (By Bob Teoh/ MySinchew)