Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times Barry Wain (grave mercy .TXT) 📖

in publicly listed companies. They borrowed millions from banks and often did not repay. Illegally importing luxury cars and selling them to friends and family was a common cash-raising exercise. Some of the sultans gambled and celebrated Christian holidays, despite Islamic prohibitions.[63]

On top of the privy purse — salaries, allowances and expenses to maintain the sultans' primary dwellings — which totaled about RM200 million annually, "they've always asked for more, like land and timber concessions", said Dr. Mahathir.[64] The rulers were each entitled to reside in more than seven palaces, and had been granted more land and logging concessions than could be traversed in weeks of hiking. Pahang's Sultan Ahmad Shah, one of the country's richest rulers, had at least a dozen palaces, his own Boeing 727 and 200 polo ponies kept in air-conditioned stables. According to state officials, the prime timber concessions allocated to him in the previous five years were estimated to be worth RM270 million.[65]

As if the disclosure of the scandalous waste of public funds was not enough, Dr. Mahathir announced that the royal households would be squeezed financially. Henceforth, they would receive only what was specified in the federal and state constitutions. As the extras were withdrawn, to curb what Dr. Mahathir called their "lavish lifestyle",[66] the sultans would find themselves without government-paid air transport, outriders and special hospital wards. Free postage facilities were being restricted or withdrawn altogether. Most members of royal families would be denied the diplomatic passports they were accustomed to, and Malaysian missions abroad would be forbidden to entertain rulers' families during private visits and help with such tasks as booking airport VIP rooms.

If the sultans were tempted to go to court, they would probably regret it. UMNO officials indicated that, if challenged, the government was prepared to produce evidence to substantiate the need for the amendments. It might involve calling the victims of rape or torture to testify in open court, or providing details of cheating, smuggling and over-spending by royal family members, with the prospect of even more horrific revelations.

With this sort of heavy artillery arrayed against them, the rulers capitulated. Their surrender was presented as a face-saving agreement after negotiations, but the minor modifications to be made to the bill could not hide the truth. The alterations dealt primarily with the procedures to be followed by the special court, though one also specified that no sultan could be charged without the personal consent of Malaysia's attorney general.[67]

Not content with this success, Dr. Mahathir used the introduction of the modifications in Parliament to torment the only one of the rulers still prepared to stand and argue. Already unpopular with UMNO for politicking for the party's opponents in Kelantan, Sultan Ismail Petra continued to denounce the amendments as unconstitutional. Dr. Mahathir said the sultan's remarks cleared the way for commoners to question the validity of his appointment and installation as head of the state's royal household. The press dutifully followed up Dr. Mahathir's attack with stories suggesting that Sultan Ismail, born of a commoner mother, was not the rightful successor and that his cousin, a businessman, should have become ruler.

Hardly had that controversy faded than Dr. Mahathir moved with supreme confidence to demonstrate the total subjugation of the monarchy. The Constitution (Amendment) Act 1994, introduced without warning in May, sealed the rulers' fate in a welter of provisions that affected the judiciary as much as the monarchy. One removed the king's right to delay a bill with a statement of reasons, which was the compromise ten years earlier. The king must now give assent within 30 days, or the bill would become law automatically. A similar provision applied to the sultans and state legislation, the very reason they had dug in their heels previously. In contrast with the titanic struggles of 1983-84 and 1992-93, the rulers uttered not a squeak of protest this time. Mindful that their mandated allowances could be cut and their access to business squeezed, they had lost the will to fight another round with Dr. Mahathir.

Tunku Abdul Rahman was convinced that Dr. Mahathir was trying to abolish the monarchy and install himself as the president of a Malaysian republic. In conversations with his official biographer in 1988, the Tunku condemned Dr. Mahathir as "irresponsible" and added, "He cares nothing for class, for law, for order, for the Constitution. What suits him, he just does it."[68]

There was considerable truth and a hint of revenge in the Tunku's trenchant observations. From the political wilderness in 1970, Dr. Mahathir had condemned the Tunku's administration, not least for its willingness to rewrite the independence Constitution: "The manner, the frequency and the trivial reasons for altering the Constitution reduced this supreme law of the nation to a useless scrap of paper."[69] Yet under Dr. Mahathir the pace of constitutional change did not slacken, his government pushing 25 amendments through Parliament in 22 years.[70] The record showed he did not accept the opinion of constitutional experts, much less his own declaration,[71] that Malaysia's Constitution should indeed be supreme, above all the institutions of government.

But while Dr. Mahathir had little time for the royalty where it represented a feudal order, he never seriously contemplated reforming the monarchy or eliminating it altogether. His basic requirement was that the monarchy should not obstruct him and his nation-building goals. A powerful prime minister with a reformist bent might have taken steps to persuade the sultans to behave as real and admired constitutional monarchs. He could have issued instructions through the chief ministers of the Malay states to ensure the sultans stayed out of business and the appointment of local officials, eschewed gambling and other social vices and generally comported themselves in an exemplary manner. Dr. Mahathir's failure to project a model institution worthy of emulation, as Chandra Muzaffar termed it,[72] meant the problem would inevitably recur. And, indeed, some royal households began flexing their political muscles again, intervening to get their nominees appointed as chief ministers of Trengganu and Perlis in 2008, as Malaysia sank into despair