Tuesday, August 26, 2008

RULE OF LAW



Today i am going to write on the 4th tenet of the Rukunegara. I must say, time is moving so fast, that in just 5 days we would be celebrating our 51st Independence Day and that also mean that i have just another 5 days to complete my writing on Rukunegara.


I just did not know how to start writing about the 4th tenet of the Rukunegara - i just did not have the inspiration. But, i need to finish what i started, friends began calling me and asking me where is the 4th and 5th tenets of Rukunegara. I am not a Law expert although i have always wanted to be a Lawyer, perhaps now is the right time.


Anyway, now back to my track.........


Justice in found in the rule of law. Every citizen is equal before the law. Fundamental liberties are guaranteed to all citizens irrespective of their race or religion. These include liberty of the person, equal protection of the law, freedom of the Constitution confers on a citizen the right of free speech, assembly and association and this right may be enjoyed freely subject only to limitations imposed by law.

Having mentioned that, we need to be careful in exercising the freedom, even in countries so developed and so called ‘Super Power’ there are no such thing as FREEDOM in total. For example, just because a person feels that it is his right to say whatever he wants to say – citing the FREEDOM of speech, can he go inside a theater and shout ‘FIRE’. Off course, he may be arrested for causing panic to the other patrons of the theater.

As much as we want to have FREEDOM, we need to be cautious, we live in a country that is multi-racial, multi-religion, multi-culture and I can go on saying how different we are all are in this country. As such it is very important that we know what our limits are and we should work along those lines.

We must remember that the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the constitution do not include the right to overthrow the Government either by force or by other unconstitutional means. Although, off late there are a few politicians who are trying to overthrow the government and they want to rule the government using a back-door entry. I am sure they know what the constitution better than the ordinary citizens in this country and they should not mislead the people.

The Rule of Law is ensured by the existence of an independent judiciary with powers to pronounce on the constitutionality and legality or otherwise of executive acts.

MY VIEWS…….. We must remember whatever rule of law we have in this country and however strong the judiciary is in this country – it cannot supersede the Constitution of Malaysia.

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