Separation of Powers between the Party and the Government
Very simple and straight forward, isn't so? Well, not many of us would know if the mixture of powers between the party and the government were to continue. Somehow, the government machinery would eventually become the party's organ. It would not happen directly but rather in an indirect manner as the machinery of the government of the day would eventually answers to the ruling party's call.
The question here is, does the party own the government and does government belongs to any particular ruling party? Let us all not be mistaken of this subject herein. This subject purely refers to the democratic nation in particular and not those with one-party rule.
A party is elected by the people in a general election for a term or more to govern the nation. Once the party is elected by the people to govern, the party would then be able to formulate policies for the government to implement to the people and the entire nation. One particular concern here is, does the government serves the interest of the ruling party entirely? If there is a mixture of powers between the ruling party and the government itself, would it be possible for the government to maintain its accountability and transparency?
Yes, in nations who are now adopting the practice of mixing the party affairs with the government, there are much concerns that are need to be observed. For instance, in Malaysia itself, such practice by putting the entire party affairs into the government of the day has resulted to grave consequences, such as corruption, power abuse, cronyism, mismanagement and other close door dealings which are deemed to be against the professionalism of the government administration. In many such occasions the government machinery would become more political instead of that of apolitical.
Members of the party executives holding ministerial positions in the government would tend to misuse his powers and roles in awarding businesses of supplies, contract or services to fellow party colleagues or members, depending on how close there connections are. This is what we call cronyism. And if such thing happen, the businesses of supplies, contracts or services is being would then mark up its offers above the market rates in order to seek a higher profit margin or gain. In turn, when such businesses are being awarded by the minister to his fellow party member, who will in turn provide the minister with some returns as a form of token appreciation, then power abuse and corruption shall come into the picture.
What if these business offers are not being held via open tender system and being carried out in a close door session, would there be any accountability or transparency? Of course, there wouldn't even exist in the first place if such practices were to take place.
This is a simple example and explanation on how by mixing up the affairs of the ruling party with the government machinery of the day, the many negative elements from the political circle would come into the picture.
Some people may argue that members of the ruling party's executive would need to sit in the government as ministers as well because they are the ones who are formulating policies for the government and they need to be in the government positions in order to ensure that these policies are being implemented as per the ruling party's formulation. Yes, we knew that too, but would it be carried out in a transparent and accountable manner. Should there be any miscalculation during the implementation, who would be responsible or held accountable?
Just look at our country Malaysia, which has been rule by the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition dominated by the main party Umno for decades. For more than 55 years of governance, with these top party leaders holding up all those ministerial positions in the government, corruptions, power abuse, cronyism and mismanagements are running like nobody's business. The government coffers is near to drying up now as the result of overspending and all those negative elements.
What would you see from all the explanations and elaborations herein? You would observe that the prime minister and his cabinet ministers would then to serve the party's interests more than the public interests at large. As such, the larger segment of our people and the nation has been totally ignored.
Let us take a look of the Umno's New Economic Policy (NEP) which was previously introduced to help the majority Malay community in their education and economic wellbeing in order to set them as per par of the current competing market forces. Unfortunately, after more than 55 years of the NEP implementation, the community was still held aback and under developed. The economic equity has not even achieve its targeted percentage. What happened here shows that the current government had used the NEP to serve the interest of the ruling party rather than the majority of the people out there.
So, this is where the separation of powers between the party and the government need to come in. Yes, the party is elected to be the government by the people, but it does not mean the party owns the government of the day. As such, the ruling party must be specifically clear on what is the role of the ruling party's executives and the ministers appointed to manage the government.
There a number of examples, particularly the developed nations, like Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Canada, Taiwan, Korea and the United States. In these countries, the members of the executive of the ruling parties does not sit in the government at the same time. But instead there are a separate team of party professionals (non-party executives) being appointed to become ministers in the government of the day, which includes the prime minister or president who are not even the chairman or president of the ruling party. As prime minister or president of the nation, they are only nominally called leader of the party that they are attached to.
To our surprise, even the opposition bench of these countries also adopt the separation of powers between their party executives and their institution of shadow cabinets, this means the members of the party executives are neither members in the shadow cabinets and vice versa.
Such practices also provides a check and balance systems in both sides of the political divide in order to ensure that the professionalism of governance does not compromise with party affairs and its political relationship. It clearly states that the party does not own the government of the day but merely run the government on the mandate of the people.
We hope that one day, our nation's political parties would soon come to realize that such practice would be required, in order to wipe out all those negative elements from within the establishment. And if it could not be implemented immediately because of the current political culture, it can be adopted stage by stage, and during the process, the method could also be open up for discussions and debates in order to seek a deeper understanding from the political segment and the general public.
