KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 20): Former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad today said that party-hopping cannot be outrightly banned as there are circumstances in which party-hopping should be allowed.

Giving his speech on the Royal Address in Parliament today, the Langkawi Member of Parliament (MP) said that the proposed bills to enforce anti-party-hopping among MPs need to be studied and defined clearly as there are cases where party-hopping is deemed necessary.

Dr Mahathir said that when there are no parties with enough numbers to form a government, then there will be a necessity for small parties to come together with major parties to garner enough MPs to form the next government.

Dr Mahathir, who is the leader of Parti Pejuang Tanah Air, said that small parties who join bigger parties should not be penalised under the new law as these parties have to cross over to get the number in the House.

Besides Dr Mahathir, the party has three other MPs, namely Datuk Seri Mukhriz Mahathir (Jerlun), who is also the party president, Datuk Wira Amiruddin Hamzah (Kubang Pasu) and Datuk Dr Shahruddin Md Salleh (Sri Gading).

“If this (party-hopping) is done according to the rules of the party constitution, and in an organised manner and if the party agrees [to it], then it should be accepted,” he said, adding that an outright party-hopping ban is unfeasible without clear definitions.

Pengerang MP from Barisan Nasional (BN) Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said had submitted a notice of motion to the Dewan Rakyat Speaker for a private member's bill to propose the new law.

She proposed for the bill to be named the "Dismissal of Members of Parliament Bill 2021".

With this, she urged the de facto law minister and the Speaker of the House to expedite the bill as she said that "frogs can jump at any time".

She asked for her bill to be combined with the anti-hopping bill and for it to be debated and taken up by the government to create a more "credible" Parliament.

Meanwhile, without naming anyone in particular, Dr Mahathir criticised the government for giving ministerial benefits such as salaries and bonuses to politicians who are not ministers, calling it a form of corruption.

“This is corruption because he (the recipient) will focus on the benefits he gets instead of concentrating on his role,” he said.

Dr Mahathir also argued that there is nothing in the Constitution about giving ministerial benefits to politicians, and said that there should be a set of criteria that should be met before these roles are given out.

However, Dr Mahathir admitted to doing this during his time as the prime minister but said that the post was given to someone who was retired from politics and due to their expertise in certain fields.

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