Earlier this month, four of Negeri Sembilan’s powerful traditional chieftains — known as the Undangs, deposed Tuanku Muhriz Tuanku Munawir from the office of King of Negeri Sembilan.
In his place, they declared Tunku Nadzaruddin Tuanku Ja'afar as the new ruler.
Tuanku Muhriz has resisted his dismissal and the Negeri Sembilan Menteri Besar Aminuddin Harun has taken the side of Tuanku Muhriz against the Undangs.
Earlier today, 14 Umno Aduns, citing loss of confidence in Aminuddin's handling of the royal crisis, have withdrawn support for the state government.
With the support of 5 PN Aduns, Umno then declared that it has the numbers to form the state government of Negeri Sembilan .
Aminuddin's Pakatan Harapan currently holds 17 seats is the Negeri Sembilan state assembly
Umno controls 14 seats.
Perikatan Nasional holds 5 seats.
With the support of PN, Umno now holds the minimum 19 seats needed to form the new state government.
However, the role of confirming that UMNO and PN have the minimum number of support in the state assembly and assent to the formation of the new government belongs to the king of Negeri Sembilan.
The problem is that we can't be sure who the king of Negeri Sembilan is today.
If Tuanku Muhriz is the king, it is hard to see why he would confirm the new Umno led government, against the Aminuddin led PH government, that is being overthrown by Umno precisely because Aminuddin supported Tuanku Muhriz's claim to the throne.
But if Tuanku Muhriz doesn't assent to the formation of the Umno led state government , what if Umno seeks the assent of Tunku Nadzaruddin instead, under the excuse that Tunku Nadzaruddin is the rightful king of Negeri Sembilan ?
If Umno does that, and there is a chance that it might do that, then it will raise a problem of Negeri Sembilan having two kings and two government - one king is Tuanku Muhriz who is backed the the PH government and the other is Tunku Nadzaruddin that is backed by the Umno-PN government.
The very fact that Umno had cited the reason it lost confidence in Aminuddiin as Menteri Besar is because of Aminuddin"s handling of the royal crisis, when Aminuddin had handled it by siding with Tuanku Muhriz's position, is already hinting at who Umno might see as the real ruler of Negeri Sembilan.
If it comes to pass that this crisis causes Negeri Sembilan to have two kings and two governments, instead of one king and one government, it will be akin to it not having any king or any government.
The decision of Umno to "catch fish in murky waters" during the royal crisis in Negeri Sembilan to seize a political advantage is likely going to make the already convoluted existential crisis in Negeri Sembilan even more convoluted.
Umno claiming that it has the numbers to form the new state government is not only not going to solve the existing crisis in Negeri Sembilan, it has introduced a whole new problem into the mix as well
Because of Umno's move, now we do not only have a royal crisis, but a crisis at the state government level too, and both these crises are reinforcing each other, to make an already impossible problem to become even more impossible.
If until today, the problem with Negeri Sembilan is that we don't know whether it has one king, two kings or no Kings, because of Umno's actions today, it might come to pass that we might not know whether it has one government, two governments or no government either.
Expect things to get worse before it gets better.
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