KUALA LUMPUR, Mar 20 — Patriot president Brig Jen (Rtd) Datuk Mohamed Arshad Raji today said that Defence Minister Datuk Seri ismail Sabri Yaakob does not have the right to deploy the army and that the mobilisation initiative set for Sunday was premature.

"The defence minister must understand that he does not have the authority to deploy any unit of the armed forces or make any reference to such an act.

"The authority lies solely with the respective Service Chiefs through a consensus being discussed and agreed upon by the Service Chief’s Council Presided upon by the Chief Defence Force (CDF),” Mohamed Arshad said in a statement.

Arshad said the deployment of the army was hasty and premature and the police are capable of handling the situation.

He also chided the minister for being too keen to deploy the army without consulting his CDF which ended up with two contradictory statements with the CDF saying the army won’t be deployed while Ismail said it will.

"It appears that the defence minister is only too keen to deploy the military. Earlier when the CDF made the announcement that the military would not be deployed for the Movement Control Order (MCO), it was to stem fear and confusion among the masses, and to calm the mass paranoia of buying up household needs, and rightfully so,” said Mohamed Arshad.

The Malaysian Armed Forces will deploy on Sunday to assist civilian authorities in enforcing the MCO, Ismail said today.

On why the military was being deployed, he said the Health Ministry was authorised to request such support if needed using Section 5 of the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases Act 1988.

"On the government’s restrictive movement order, we believe the police, being the authority to effect the order, has sufficient resources to control and managed the order effectively.

"The more than 130,000 personnel, and particularly from the General Operational Force that are currently positioned in different parts of the country, can be deployed for such a task,” said Mohamed Arshad.

"Patriot is confident that the police will professionally execute the task given. After all it is barely three days that the MCO has been gazetted and the police must be allowed to execute their task. The defence minister must have full trust and confidence in the ability of our police force who are experienced enough in dealing with internal security issues.”

He, however, added that there is a more pressing need for proper and effective communication to the masses on the need to stay put and be disciplined about practising social distancing.