S'gor speaker chides Azmin for wild claims over house conduct

Selangor state assembly speaker Lau Weng San has called upon state opposition leader Azmin Ali to apologise over his allegations about Lau’s conduct during house proceedings.

This includes, among others, claims that the speaker had shortened proceedings days and acted unprofessionally.

“I cannot trivialise the wild accusations levelled against me. Hence, I urge the opposition leader to admit to his mistakes, retract his statements and apologise,” Lau (above) said in a statement.

On July 11, Azmin took to Facebook to accuse the speaker of shortening the state assembly session from 10 days to five.

He also alleged that while opposition lawmakers had issued 420 questions to the state government - 210 oral questions and 210 written ones - only 27 written replies were provided.

“Even the debate on the First Selangor Plan’s half-term review was limited to 10 minutes per assemblyperson. Why the rush to limit the debate?

“The state executive councillor-in-charge did not provide enough space for us to ask questions during his winding-up session and only gave written answers.

“And the speaker was unprofessional and did not follow the Constitution or other related laws,” the Hulu Kelang lawmaker alleged.

Opposition given more time

In his rebuttal, Lau said all assemblypersons were given 15 minutes to debate and the backbenchers chief had 25 minutes.

“The opposition leader got 50 minutes (to debate the issue) and the Sijangkang lawmaker (Ahmad Yunus Hairi) took 25 minutes to debate the First Selangor Plan.

“Assemblypersons were given more time compared to the previous two proceedings. Hence, the opposition leader’s claim that they were only given 10 minutes is false.”

On the shortened proceedings days, Lau said he had increased proceedings hours between one to two hours daily to accord enough time to all lawmakers.

Citing precedents, Lau reminded Azmin of his time as Selangor menteri besar and how proceedings days got cut short during his tenure.

“For the house-sitting set from Aug 17, 2015 to Aug 28, 2015, the proceedings were cut short to four days.

“The same happened for proceedings between Aug 1, 2016 and Aug 12, 2016 (cut to two days) and the one between July 24, 2017 and July 28, 2017 (cut to two days),” he said.

Lau also reminded Azmin that the Conference of Rulers’ meeting would be held on July 17 and 18, and the Yang di-Pertuan Agong’s coronation ceremony would take place on July 20.

“Surely, the opposition leader knows that the menteri besar has to accompany their respective state rulers to these events,” he added.

Lau said despite the shortened period, 64 oral questions were answered, excluding those answered jointly by government agencies.

He added that he also allowed an additional 84 questions to be answered.

“As such, the allegations made by the opposition leader are false and unprofessional.”

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