Malaysians!! Know Our Constitution (part 2)

I will only stated few Articles from Federal Constitution as I wrote in my previous post with the title "Malaysians!! Now Our Constitution".

The following parts are taken from Malaysian Federal Constitution (but I will not take all part of the particular Article to be written here) ;

Article 3. Religion of Federation
(1) Islam is the religion of the Federation; but other religions may be practised in peace and harmony in any part of the Federation.

Article 4. Supreme law of the Federation
(1) This Constitution is the supreme law of the Federation and any law passed after Merdeka Day which is inconsistent with this Constitution shall, to the extent of the inconsistency, be void.

Fundamental Liberties

Article 5. Liberty of the person
(1) No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty save in accordance with law.

Article 6. Slavery and forced labour prohibited
(1) No person shall be held in slavery.
(2) All forms of forced labour are prohibited, but Parliament may by law provide for compulsary service for national purposes.

Article 7. Protection against retrospective criminal law and repeated trials
(1) No person shall be punished for an act or omission which was not punished by law when it was done or made, and ........
(2) A person who has been acquitted or convicted on an offence shall not be tried again for the same offence except ........

Article 8. Equality
(1) All person are equal before the law and entitled to the equal protection of the law.

Article 9. Prohibition of banishment and freedom of movement
(1) No citizen shall be banished or excluded from the Federation.

Article 10. Freedom of speech, assembly and association
(1) Subject to Clauses (2), (3) and (4)
(a) every citizen has the right to freedom of speech and expression
(b) all citizens have the right to assemble peaceably and without arms
(c) all citizens have the right to form associations

Article 11. Freedom of religion
(1) Every person has the right to profess and practise his religion and subject to Clause (4), to propagate it.

Article 12. Right in respect of education
(1) Without prejudice to the generality of Article 8, there shall be no discrimination against any citizen on the grounds only of religion, race, descent or place of birth -
(a) in the administration of any educational institution by a public authority, and, in particular, the admission of pupils or students or the payment of fees;
or
(b) in providing out of funds of a public authority financial aid for the maintenance or education of pupils or students....

Article 13. Rights to property
(1) No person shall be deprived of property save in accordance with law.

Article 153. Reservation of quotas in respect of services, permit, etc., for Malays and natives of any of the States of Sabah and Sarawak
(1) It shall be the responsibility of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to safeguard the special position of the Malays and natives of any of the States of Sabah and Sarawak and the legitimate interests of other communities to accordance with the provisions of this Article.

---x---x---x---

Reminder: Above in only few Articles I choose to be written here, exactly taken from Malaysian Federal Constitution. However, those Articles are not written in full and I only wrote the first part of each Article. All Articles above must be read together with other Clauses in each Article.
Wording use in every Article usually interpreted by the Court when handling the case regarding Constitutional Law. So, to know and to understand the Constitution is very important especially the part of fundamental liberties because there are people who wrongly interpret those rights. So, it's better if Malaysians can get one copy of Malaysian Federal Constitution from any main bookstores and find it at Law's section.

Malaysians!! Know Our Constitution

Constitution can be divided into written and unwritten constitution. Malaysia adapts written constitution. Malaysian Constitution called Malaysian Federal Constitution and it is the highest law of the land. As Constitution is the highest law, it is a supreme authority of the federation and constitutional supremacy applied. Constitution supremacy means Constitution has superiority over ordinary laws in that any Act passed which is inconsistent with the Constitution shall be void to the extent of the inconsistency. Constitution limits the powers of executive, legislature and judiciary.

Malaysian Federal Constitution consists 183 Articles and 13 Schedules. Among the main Articles to be mentioned here is Article 3, Article 4, Article 5-13, and Article 153. Other Articles also important but I only want to focus on the Articles said above. Article three about Islam as religion of federation, Article 4 is about Federal Constitution as supreme law of the land, Article 5-13 stated the fundamental liberties and Article 153 regarding special position of Malays and native Sabah and Sarawak.

I got to go. Maghrib prayer's time. I will continue soon.

Constitution and Constitutionalism

Now, I am officially reactivating my first blog after I left it behind for a while. I made a decision to reactivate this blog by writing one entry regarding legal matter. Plus, my final exam is just round a corner. I am thinking, by writing something legal matter, it will help me to remember what I had learn in this 4 months.

As far as I concern, each country in this world must have its own constitutional law. When talking about constitutional law, two important things involve namely constitution and constitutionalism. So what the differences between these two things.

Constitution according to A.V. Dicey is "all rules which directly or indirectly affected the distribution of the sovereign power in the state make up the Constitution of the State". However there are also another definitons given by another legal experts. Simply said, a constitution lays down the most important rules that describe the organs of the State - their organization and form of administration, their composition, functions, powers, limit and mutual relationship which is the relationship between the government and citizens, it also mentions the fundamental liberties of citizens and the procedure to amend the constitution.

While constitutionalism is a number of universal doctrine whose purpose is to ensure the governmental powersare limited and the adherence of these doctrines ensure the good governance and the workability of the Constitution. The doctrines namely Rule of Law, Separation of Power and Responsible Government.

The point is, the constitution is the law itself but constitutionalism is the notion. Some countries successfully adapt the notion in their law but some are less succeed.