Some people see Muar MP Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman’s 200km run from Muar to Parliament to raise funds for his constituency as an effort to gain sympathy. Well, that may be one of the reasons.

As an opposition MP, he has been deprived of a RM20 million allocation to his constituency which all government MPs get. Opposition MPs therefore can not service their constituency in the way government MPs can. This may translate to a loss of motive to continue supporting opposition MPs unless the voters’ loyalty to their candidates remains intact.

So, people should be sympathetic towards opposition MPs and support them in every way they can to ensure that the government has a strong opposition.

Another reason for Syed Saddiq’s Langkah Muar from July 1-4 was to draw attention to the government’s refusal to give allocations to all constituencies. Why the government does not want to provide equal constituency funding to all MPs is beyond understanding.

According to a Malaysiakini report (July 4, 2024), Ilham Centre executive director Hisommudin Bakar said the government wanted assurances from the opposition for political stability and their acceptance of the legitimacy of this government until the 16th general election.

Both conditions are undemocratic. It is the constitutional right of voters to want a change of government and they should not be robbed of that right. The legitimacy of the current unity government has always been in question because of the way it was formed with an appointed prime minister. In a democracy prime ministers are elected by the majority.

Hisommudin also said that the government wanted a similar arrangement like “the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Transformation and Political Stability between Putrajaya and Pakatan Harapan during the administration of Ismail Sabri Yaakob”.

In a democracy, a government does not sign an MoU to prevent the Opposition from taking over the government. Any party can initiate a coalition to form a majority government and that is the right of the people that must always be left as a possibility. Signing away that right isn’t democracy.

It was by choice that the Pakatan Harapan as the Opposition then took the initiative to sign the MoU with Sabri. Sabri didn’t bribe them with a promise of constituency funding.

It is a precedent that the current Opposition should not emulate because it is undemocratic.

The Anwar Ibrahim administration is continuing a practice of the past of depriving the Opposition of constituency funds. True to his promise of reform, Anwar should break this practice and not use it to force support for his administration.

Did Syed Saddiq succeed in drawing attention to the plight of the opposition MPs? That is hard to determine. But, I like to think that the people are aware, but, perhaps, they think that there is nothing they can do.

That, however, is not quite true. Syed Saddiq must be given credit for taking the bull by the horns. He could have sat back and limited his service to what his funds allowed. Or, made deals and pledged his support to Anwar, which are what our MPs are prone to do to survive. Or, found the easy way out by announcing in a video that he needs funds and appealed to the people to give it.

He did no such thing. Instead, he held on to democratic principles and, resorted to a healthy, creative and law-abiding way to raise funds for his constituency. He ran.

Syed Saddiq ran and the RM160,000 he collected was honest-to-goodness freely given money.

He did what he could do to solve a problem. That is to be emulated.

We need political leaders who will solve problems, not make things worse. Syed Saddiq’s run was an attempt to solve a problem too big for one person to undertake. But it was a good start. And, more politicians should join him should there be a next attempt at solving a problem. And the people, too, should join him to symbolically declare they would support every effort by leaders to solve problems in the proper way, according to the rule of law.

This young politician is showing that he is not going to take things lying down. He will find a way to lessen the burden of the people and not just depend on the government to keep helping him. That is an attitude that should be applauded and the people should rally behind him.