For a country which claims to be on the road to being a developed nation, it makes me laugh to learn that the speaker of the Dewan Rakyat took it upon himself to reject outright the opposition’s ‘No Confidence’ motion.

So much for Pak Lah’s transparency, openness blah blah blah, not to mention his proud claim to be a good Muslim leader. A primary school student will not believe that the speaker’s decision was not his alone because he, too, is a BN rep.

In the first place, the motion merely wants a debate without a division. Thus the speaker should have allowed the opposition to have its day. Since it does not require a division, the BN MPs can even stay away.

Sadly, Pak Lah had missed another great opportunity to redeem his already tarnished administration because as a Muslim leader he could have asked the debate on the motion to go ahead.

Better still, with a clear majority in the House, he could have instructed that a division be carried out, remove the BN’s three-line Whip (so also the opposition) and let MPs vote with their conscience.

The result would be good for democracy - a few BN and opposition MPs abstaining or perhaps one or two BN and opposition MPs crossing the floor (if at all the MPs have any conscience).

Meanwhile outside, the police and the organisers of the allegedly planned rally should cooperate to ensure a peaceful event which will only make Malaysians proud. That would also have been a great victory for Malaysia’s Westminster-type democracy.

Alas, Pak Lah and his gang are so scared of their own shadows and of each other’s shadow.

With that speaker’s decision, our parliament remains in the Dark Ages, the opposition very much at the mercy of the ruling party.

The opposition should now plan a new move. They should demand an ‘Opposition Day’ in the House, say once in every two weeks, and opposition MPs should demand that they be allowed to table Early Day Motions (EDM) to tell the people they are doing something in the House other than asking oral and written questions.

Umno and BN leaders have always tried to intimidate or fool the rakyat by saying that our democracy is only 50 years old, our people are still uneducated and closed-minded, blah blah blah.

But look at Thailand. Despite military rule from time to time, their democracy is way ahead of Malaysia’s not to mention their truly independent Election Commission and the Constitutional Court.

Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej has lost a few ministers over the ‘small issue’ of adhering to the World Court decision that an ancient Buddhist temple in the border areas with Cambodia belonged to Cambodia.

But the Thai people are angry with this surrender of Thai territory and are now asking the anti-corruption watchdog to consider treason charges against Samak for backing the World Court move.

Similarly, the South Korean government has recalled its ambassador to Japan following a dispute over some islands which the Japanese claim as theirs.

In our case, former Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar (if not the whole cabinet) should be man enough to resign over our failure in the International Court of Justice in which we lost Pulau Batu Putih to Singapore.

What the hell, we don’t even have a truly independent constitutional court to truly represent the conscience of the people. Long live Pak Lah and his merry men!