Perak... and Wisdom Royale

Perak... and Wisdom Royale
For whatever reasons, the Perak Sultan's official website ( http://sultan.perak.gov.my ) has been taken down since yesterday. (The mirror is still available on Dreambook, though defaced with replaced content to over-write the original ones.)
Elsewhere in the cyberspace, if you are resourceful and I am not willing to publish the URL, you can read forum postings that derogate Sultan Azlan Shah, the former Lord President of Malaysia.
The general tone in those forum postings is that, if people's questioning the constitutional authority of the Sultan is an act of derhaka (betrayal the royalty), then, is how the Sultan had acted in the Perak state government crisis an act of "menderhakakan kesultanan itu sendiri" (betraying the sultanate itself)? Most of the postings are anger-propelled, so I won't go into the specifics. But if the emotions on the cyberspace go unchecked, they may spill-over into real world sentiments and the image of the royal family may be forever impaired.
Cindy Tham of The Nut Graph has a take on this, albeit a mild one, while Straits Times Singapore asks if the Perak royalty's built-up reputation as the voices of the nation's conscience is in tatters.
Nevertheless, elsewhere in the cyberspace where bloggers don't blog anonymously, there had been rational debates on the stand taken by the Perak Sultan in handling the political situation.
Lawyer-blogger Malik Imtiaz Sarwar offers his respectful view ithat His Highness may have acted erroneously in directing the resignation of the Mentri Besar, Mohd Nizar Jamaluddin.
In his latest entry titled: Perak, A Constitutional Crisis, Imtiaz chronicles that unfolding episodes and says:
...it is apparent that His Highness considered the situation to be one in which the Mentri Besar had ceased to command the confidence of the majority of the members. In doing so, His Highness accepted the three disputed members as still being members of the Assembly and as such approached the situation on the assumption that the Barisan block outnumbered Pakatan by three instead of one.
The Sultan's actions, hence, raises the question whether he has contravened Article 16(6) of the Constitution. Imtiaz reasons:
* as noted above Article 16(6) is specifically directed to a no-confidence scenario, that is the incumbent Mentri Besar can seek the dissolution of the Assembly upon his having ceased to command the confidence of the majority
* Article 36(2) however provides more generally that His Highness has the power to dissolve the assembly. It is clear that this provision is aimed at allowing His Highness to dissolve the Assembly for other reasons thought to be appropriate
* as a matter of law His Highness is empowered to do what is permitted under the Perak Constitution and the Federal Constitution. This is the essence of a constitutional monarchy
* the Perak Constitution does not empower His Highness to dismiss the Mentri Besar. The manner in which the Mentri Besar is to be removed from office is as provided for under Article 16(6), through a refusal to dissolve the Assembly at the request of the Mentri Besar when the Mentri Besar has ceased to command the confidence of the majority of the Assembly.
Imtiaz adds: "...all things considered His Highness had come to the conclusion that in any event the Mentri Besar no longer commanded confidence. In this context, the central question is whether His Highness was empowered to conclude that the incumbent Mentri Besar no longer commanded the confidence of the Assembly without there having been a vote of no confidence."
He quotes a precedent to illustrate how the Sultan may have erred. Yes, the famous 1966 precedent of Stephan Kalong Ningkan, the chief minister of Sarawak who was deposed in similar political manoeuvres, but with harsher outcome when Najib's father was pulling the puppet strings behind Tunku Abdul Rahman. Go to Imtiaz's blog to read the details.
Meanwhile, Kit points us to the same Sultan who held a somewhat different persona some years ago.
In his book “Constitutional Monarchy, Rule of Law and Good Governance” (2004), the former Lord President wrote:
“Under normal circumstances, it is taken for granted that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong would not withhold his consent to a request for dissolution of parliament. His role is purely formal.”
He also pointed out that no sultan or agung had withheld consent to dissolve legislative body, except in Kelantan in 1977.
Deja vu? People may now frown upon the royal family with changed views.
THAT... is the real crisis. Not the PR losing power in a political coup d'etat.
To the rest of the nation, I say get beck to nurse the economic woes, end the politicking, bite the bullet, fight another day.

http://www.jeffooi.com/2009/02/perak_and_wisdom_royale.php