Rais: Cabinet should resign with outgoing PM

Kuala Lumpur, March 27 - malaysianinsider | By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani

Losing Umno vice-presidential candidate Datuk Seri Rais Yatim said the entire Cabinet must technically resign when Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi steps down.

“It is a ideal situation, when a prime minister resigns all his ministers are deemed to have resigned. This is the conventional interpretation of the Westminster system,” the Foreign Minister told reporters at the Umno General Assembly today.

He explained that it was in line with the collective responsibility that the ministers must step down when the Prime Minister resigns.

“Whether or not it is followed or not, it is up to the minister to decide."

On the party elections, Rais said money politics was a serious problem and that the delegates did not follow the advice given by the party leaders.

“We cannot gauge it (money politics) yet, but the fundamentals of money politics has to be analysed later as I hope the disciplinary committee would probe into the matter than what they see at present. The talk of this and the distribution (of money) has been the talk of the day. I wouldn’t comment more than that,” he added.

The former Semangat 46 leader also congratulated and wished the winners the best of luck even though he still questioned some of the new party leaders’ credibility.

“Obviously little is given to performance, or track record. If you see at the list of the mps, a few had actually touched ground with real politics and yet they aim (high). So we cannot conclude yet but a serious study has to be done and it is my fervent hope that money politics will be solved a year or two from today,” he said.

Party sources said Najib is likely to appoint some of the candidates to the powerful supreme council despite their defeat.

Rais responded that he has not yet made up his mind when he was asked if he would accept Najib appointing him to the supreme council.

“I think that is quite far from my mind now, I haven’t thought about it but I appreciate what he has been saying. I value his judgment. How I wish the delegates are of the same view point,” he added.