KUALA LUMPUR: April 20, 2008
Some said they forgot, others said they were too busy while at least one blamed it on a communication breakdown.
Whatever the reason, bloggers slammed the MPs who did not fulfil their elected responsibility to question the Government on all sorts of issues.
According to some blogs, the number of MPs who did not submit a single query totalled 29, with 15 of them said to be from the Barisan Nasional.
The DAP has admitted that five of its MPs failed to submit questions, while six PKR MPs have come out to state why they did not submit any question.
The new Parliament session begins on April 28 with the MPs swearing in, and the “no question” issue is so hot in cyberspace that DAP adviser Lim Kit Siang had to apologise for what he termed “this regrettable episode” in his blog, saying “the excuses are not acceptable”.
“I have checked with the five DAP MPs and they have confirmed the mistake of missing the April 8 deadline for the submission of questions for the month-long inaugural meeting of the 12th Parliament starting on April 28 – although they would still be able to take part in the supplementary question stage of the daily 90-minute Question Time.
“The party had reminded DAP MPs not to miss the deadline for questions and lose the opportunity to pose questions in the first meeting of Parliament (an important aspect of the work of Opposition parliamentarians) but mistakes are still being made,” he wrote.
The five DAP MPs are Charles Anthony Santiago (Klang), Er Teck Hwa (Bakri), Dr Hiew King Cheu (Kota Kinabalu), John Fernandez (Seremban) and Dr P. Ramasamy (Batu Kawan), who is Penang Deputy Chief Minister II.
The PKR MPs were Tian Chua (Batu), Abdullah Sani Abdul Hamid (Kuala Langat), Datuk Kamarul Baharin Abbas (Teluk Kemang), N. Gopalakrishnan (Padang Serai), Ahmad Kasim (Kuala Kedah) and Rashid Din (Merbok).
Abdullah said he had been very busy and forgot about submitting questions to Parliament.
“Furthermore, I do not recall that a deadline was given to us during the (MPs) briefing (on April 3).
“Perhaps, the Parliament secretariat officers had mentioned the date when I had left the room briefly,” he added.
Gopalakrishnan said he would reveal in the Dewan Rakyat why he refrained from submitting written questions.
“You will know the answer on April 29,” he said when contacted.
Ahmad said he had already prepared 10 questions.
“But I wanted to put it as oral questions as I need time to carry out more research to ensure the questions are still relevant as some of the issues may have been resolved at ministerial level,” he said.
Rashid clarified that not submitting written questions did not mean he had no questions to ask.
“We are prepared to ask oral questions and raise supplementary questions,” he added.
Dr Hiew said he simply had no time.
“The briefing for MPs was on April 3 and I returned to Kota Kinabalu on April 5. I've explained this to the DAP leadership.”
Fernandez said he could not submit his questions earlier as he was busy setting up his service centres.
“I was reminded by my political secretaries that the deadline was nearing but I just couldn’t find the time to submit the questions,” he said.
Kamarul Baharin said his assistant had wrongly calculated the days left before the deadline to submit the questions.
“We were careless. We were given 14 working days or almost three weeks to do so but still missed the deadline.
“However, I will surely ask many supplementary questions,” he pledged.
The Barisan’s newly-elected MP for Sibuti in Sarawak, Ahmad Lai Bujang, said he sent three questions to Parliament by fax on April 18 but was surprised when told that his questions were not received.
The Barisan MP for Kimanis Datuk Hanifah Aman also stated that he could not submit questions on time
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