View minority EP proposal as an insurance policy

I refer to the report “Malays welcome minority EP proposal but stress that ‘meritocracy must be preserved’” (Sept 23).

I hope pragmatism will prevail for us to see both the wood and the trees in the proposed changes to the Elected Presidency. More importantly, I hope we will view the minority provision as a 30-year insurance policy.

Within every five rounds of elections, if no one from a particular ethnic minority has become the President under his or her own steam, then the Constitution should give a helping hand to that race.

If there is no claim on the insurance, it would mean that a minority candidate has been successfully elected within each 30-year cycle.

I hope there will be no need for such a constitutional provision to be activated and it remains a heuristic hiatus clause or, better still, an eternal white elephant in our Constitution.

It is better to buy insurance than allow our unique style of governance, and all that we have, to be in jeopardy.

It would be foolhardy not to be realistic about ourselves and not to prepare for mischance in times of calm. We cannot take things for granted.