KUALA LUMPUR: Umno’s Tan Sri Noh Omar (pix) has been ordered out of the Dewan Rakyat and barred from entering for three days for openly insulting the Speaker’s chair.
Dewan Rakyat Deputy Speaker Nga Kor Ming made the ruling today after the Tanjong Karang MP accused the former of being unfit to chair the August House in yesterday’s proceedings.
“Based on Tanjong Karang’s inappropriate action when he hurled accusations at the chair (Nga) of being unworthy of being a speaker, it is an action deemed to be insulting the dewan, or an open insult to the chair.
“As such, based on the powers given to me as a speaker, I order Tanjong Karang out of the dewan for a period of three days beginning today.
“I urge Tanjong Karang to take this as a lesson not to repeat his action to insult the dewan in the future, and hope all other parliamentarians will also act accordingly,” he said, here, today.
Noh was, however, not present in the dewan when the ruling was made.
Yesterday, Noh had said Nga was not qualified to sit in the speaker’s chair following the latter’s statement linking Umno and PAS’ cooperation to Taliban.
The decision then prompted opposition MPs to walk out in protest.
The 20 MPs from BN and PAS were led by Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri who later said the MPs will discuss if they will table a motion against Nga, accusing the latter of abusing his power.
“We urge the deputy speaker to retract the ruling as the issue raised had nothing to do with sitting.
“We believe it is a misuse of power as he (Nga) cannot suspend Tanjung Karang for an issue that had taken place outside of the Dewan Rakyat,” Ismail told reporters at the Parliament lobby, referring to a statement made by Nga on the Umno-PAS coalition that prompted Noh to ask the deputy speaker for a clarification yesterday.
