Duty at the Parliament House

29 June 2009

Another day of my work at the parliament. Confirmed by the coordinator and my office that the minister will attend the session today and will answer an oral question related to energy efficiency.
So, this morning I was at the parliament since 8.30 a.m. There were familiar faces from the ministry when I entered the ministry's room at about 9.00 a.m with my director.
We were called by the minister at about 9.30 a.m to brief him on information that he needed before he answer the question in the house.
I was a little bit nervous initially since it was the first time I have to answer the minister straight away in front of his officers and others from the ministry. Anyway, the briefing was very smooth and the minister seems happy with answers and explanation provided from by everyone in the room.

Then all of us listened to him "live" from the big screen TV in the room when he answered in to other members of the parliament in the house. I guess everyone of us in the room was very satisfied when we completed his answers and we left the room with a big smile after saying thank you ton each other until we meet up again.

When I left at about 12.00 p.m, I did not see any "incident" that sometime occurred due to some issues in the country outside the dewan.


I've been assigned on duty at the parliament since last year but that was as an assistant for another senior officer. Since then, I attended about 2 sessions at the dewan rakyat and another 1 session at the Dewan Negara. This assignment has been very new for me since I've never stepped into the parliament before that in my entire life.

However, the parliament house has become a familiar place for me now and to be honest it has been very interesting to be there as well. Other than as a resource person for my organization, I have direct access to witness the sessions live from inside the house itself. Faces of ministers ,other politicians and many more key figures from various organizations are available to be seen around there and those faces are normally see them in the newspapers of televisions if were a general public.

Witnessing the debates and exchanging of words among the MPs have been exciting all the time and indirectly all that have given me more insight on how policies being decided and issues being argued by our leaders in this country.

Other than that, ppportunities for me meeting with other officers or key people from other agencies or ministries giving me more exposure and input on what is happening in the country at least from the administrative point of view.

Today, it was another full day at the parliament since I have to be there again to attend the another special briefing organized by the ministry with the utility company at 3.00 p.m.