LETTER | What a newly appointed prime minister does in his first 24 hours in the office is a good display of his leadership skills especially during a state of crisis.

Courtesy visits to respective political leaders are expected but the immediacy to manage our country during a pandemic must be prioritised.

Our prime minister failed to respond urgently unlike during the final days of Muhyiddin Yassin’s government with meetings held till late hours to save a mandate. The magic number 112 carried a higher degree of importance than the 32.7 million people in this country.

Now with a cabinet of ministers that appears more of a facelift than a performance upgrade, it makes you wonder if the pool of talent was scarce or Ismail Sabri Yaakob was half asleep as we cried to have competent ministers as second-half substitutes.

Recently reappointed and redesignated ministers under Ismail Sabri were never apologetic for their dubious statements and/or behaviour (consistently breaking the law to prevent the spread of Covid-19) during Muhyiddin’s time.

What guarantee do we have now when it comes to; leaving our education policy to Radzi Jidin who is more certain on how he parts his hair than establishing a firm direction, raised a matter of concern that is rather worrying than a variant of concern since Dr Adham Baba swapped responsibility with Khairy Jamaluddin in taking over the national vaccination programme, more food reviews and transformation photoshoots in the corridors of Putrajaya.

I believe most of us were not naïve enough to think that it was not a quid pro quo for making Ismail Sabri the ninth prime minister. We just find it repulsive how entitled some of them were on their social media even before being sworn in!

It is now our duty to do what we are known for internationally when it comes to bullying. Be vocal against wrongdoings in any medium available and be the Big Brother (not in Hishammuddin Hussein’s context) in this ‘Keluarga Malaysia’ until the next general election.

A writer once said to me: “The sound of a sneeze or a cough makes a short horror story, but the words uttered by a Perikatan Nasional minister provides dark comedy.”

As we celebrate our 64th year of independence, even tragedies provide a beautiful story, seeing how we have come together as ‘rakyat’ during this pandemic.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.