Malaysian politics has entered into an era where nothing is impossible. Most of the people thought that it was impossible to deprive BN of its two-third majority in Parliament before the elections. Eventually, the Opposition did not merely achieved an impossible goal but as well won five state regimes.

The massive change has become an everyday hot political topic. After the elections, the people were worried about the Opposition might not be able to form state government in Selangor, Perak, Penang and Kedah. Bur surprisingly, the state governments that actually faced problems were Perlis and Terengganu which are both under the control of BN.

The dispute over the Terengganu Menteri Besar post took three weeks to play itself out, something no one could imagine possible. The constitutional crisis in Terengganu should not be simply defined as “the interference of the royal family in politics” as it is one of the rights of Sultan to appoint the state's MB. The royalty was pushed aside by the executive power during the era of strongman politics in the past 20 years.

Theoretically, the separation of powers is in fact one of the best political devices in the world. The core value for the separation of powers is the mutual check and balance among the three powers (legislative, executive and judicial). But the executive power expanded without limits under the strongman era while the legislative and judicial powers were eroded. And there was little separation of powers for effective checks and balances.

Actually, the massive change and the constitutional crisis were to be expected. In fact, with the rising public awareness over democracy and knowledge of the new royal generation, such political situations are inevitable.

The respective state constitutions have been implemented for over half of a century and is basically along the lines of the constitutional monarchy of the United Kingdom. Nothing happened in the past as the interest of the rulers were well protected and more importantly, the political arena was dominated by Umno.

However, after former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad amended twice the constitutions in the 1980s and 1990s to weaken the power of rulers, some rulers of the new generation who were highly educated and aware of democracy started to think about the future of the royal families. They also started to be concerned about the current state of politics and this demonstrated a new thinking and a new outlook of the royal families.

But the revival of royalty has triggered a new controversy. The people started to worry whether the rulers were too powerful that might lead to another round of totalitarianism.

The people's anxiety was in fact not unreasonable. Because if a ruler does not listen to the “advice” given by the leader of the ruling party and insists on appointing his preferred candidate as the MB, who is inappropriate, it means the ruler has rejected the public opinion. This has violated the parliamentary-democratic principle and made the general elections insignificant.

The reconciliation of the crisis in Terengganu depends on whether the state ruler and the federal government could achieve a compromise to make a mutual concession and choose another MB candidate who is endorsed by both parties.

There is no doubt that according to the law, the Sultan has the rights to appoint the MB of the state according to his own judgement. However, a MB that fails to gain support from the majority State Assembly persons might face a vote of no confidence. When this happens, the MB can either resign voluntarily or advice the ruler to dissolve the State Assembly for another elections.

But what if the ruler refuses to dissolve the State Assembly? Is there any article in the constitution that checks and balances the unlimited power of the Sultan?

From the people's perspective, both domination of a strong party and monarch totalitarianism will harm democracy. This is unhealthy and is far from what the people wish to see.

In short, everything seemed impossible yesterday turned out to be possible today. (LIM MUN FAH/ Translated by SOONG PHUI JEE/ Sin Chew Daily)