Getting excited with the prospect of getting our Chief Minister's post as "Premier"

It seems that our local folks including the media fraternity are excited with the proposed constitutional amendment which seeks to rename the Sarawak Chief Minister’s post as ‘Premier’. 

I will be tabling the Constitution of the State of Sarawak (Amendment) Bill, 2022, at the ongoing State Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting on 15 February and it is essentially to put Sarawak in the right perspective in our continuous journey to reclaim its rights as an equal partner in the formation of Malaysia.

I have also mentioned to our media friends that it is also to enable us, the Sarawak Government to handle more of its autonomy. We are just fine-tuning what we should be when Malaysia was formed because during the formation, there were five signatories namely the United Kingdom, Federation of Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak. 

But after Malaysia was formed, the last two entities namely Sabah and Sarawak seemed to have diluted and become just like any of the small states that are in the Federation of Malaya. So that is why we have to put things in the right perspective.

Although our Chief Minister’s post will be renamed as ‘Premier’, there will be no significant change to his role. I have also cited the designation of “assistant ministers” which has also been proposed under the Bill to be renamed “Deputy Ministers”. The former term had previously created a lot of confusion where we had assistant ministers who went on official duties overseas but were treated as though they were “assistants” to the full ministers when they should not be. So the proper term for them should be “Deputy Minister so that everybody will know their stature.

Likewise for the Chief Minister, I don’t think we would want to be on par with Penang or Melaka. When we formed Malaysia, the signatories for the federated and unfederated Malay states, there was only one representing them. But when Malaysia was formed, the situation had changed and (they) cannot tell us that we should be alright with being on the same par with other states.

I also believed generally fellow Sarawakians will be receptive towards the Constitution of the State of Sarawak (Amendment) Bill, 2022. I won’t be able to generalise or see what is the full response yet but those that have texted me have expressed that they are very happy with the Bill that I am going to table tomorrow. I will wait until tomorrow for the full deliberation because it will be too premature for me to comment on the Bill today. As it is, I can see that Sarawakians understand and they like the Bill and the proposed change.