malaysiakini and a DEMOCRATIC NATION in ICU

No the patient is not dead yet but close to it.
I do not feel proud to tell anyone I am from Perak now.
You see they have been pulling more plugs from the life-support system from the ICU and the nation is slowly losing its democratic flavour.
We still have the right to vote in elections but things can get messed up after that.
You know what happened in Perak where the due process of law was not followed but instead the people's choice of government has been usurped by unsavoury means.
You will remember how Joseph Pairin Kitingan was deprived of Sabah's leadership by elected reps being induced to leave his PBS party by the BN-led federal government. That happened in the early 90s. Well a similar take-over has been done - this time in Perak and you can read some comments of malaysiakini readers here.
There is however one major difference between Sabah and Perak.
Sabah's head of state is appointed by the ruling party and thus his tenure is limited and that episode died with the person leaving office.
In the case of Perak, the royal family has been there for hundreds of years and now we are a constitutional monarchy.
Most citizens do not owe their existence or livelihood from the generosity of the royalty compared with the past.
The only link between the royalty and the citizens is the love and respect that citizens have for the rulers. Once that link is broken and you lose the love of your people, being a royalty can become a lonely existence.

Today's NST has an interesting article Sultan, Raja Nazrin quiz assemblymen in which it was reported that

"The sultan wanted to make sure that the independent assemblymen and Nasarudin fully supported BN and would help form a stable state government," a source said.

the article goes on:

"Obviously, the sultan is not taking any chances despite the apparently solid front. This will also be fair as the previous Pakatan Rakyat administration was also required to do the same."

Now if that article is true, one should worry seriously about that patient in the ICU. let us hope more Malaysians will wake up from their apathy.