Controversies

Succession
Prior to his life as the Sultan or Agong, and even during the 1980s and early 1990s, Tunku Mahmud's reputation was more or less marred by a number of alleged controversial incidents which received occasional attention from the media. One of these earliest incidents was the loss of his status as Tunku Mahkota in 1961—a position which his father, Sultan Ismail, appointed to him two years earlier, citing reasons of alleged misbehaviour after confidential reports accusing him of incarcerating a policeman reached the Sultan. Tunku Iskandar's younger brother, Tunku Abdul Rahman was appointed as the Tunku Mahkota in favour of him. Nevertheless, in 1966, Tunku Iskandar was appointed the Raja Muda—which puts him second in line to the throne. In April 1981, Tunku Mahmud was reinstated as Tunku Mahkota shortly before his father's death the following month and was subsequently installed as the Sultan of Johor, under the orders of his father.

However, some eyewitnesses challenged the legitimacy of Tunku Mahmud's reappointment as the Tunku Mahkota, by arguing that they witnessed Sultan Ismail already having lapsed into coma at the time of his appointment as the Regent. Records stated that Sultan Ismail lapsed into a coma on 8 May, three days before his death. Relations with the Menteri Besar of Johor, Othman Saat deteriorated when the latter questioned Tunku Iskandar's legitimacy to the throne, which led to an incident which saw the Sultan issuing an order to the Menteri Besar to vacate his office within 24 hours, shortly after Sultan Ismail's death, citing reasons for the need for that office space for his own. The Menteri Besar heeded his order, though the Sultan did not move in as he had said. Othman Saat subsequently resigned the following year as the Menteri Besar.

Allegations of criminal misconduct
In 1972, Tunku Mahmud was charged for causing assault with a mace to two men for overtaking his car and was convicted the following year. A year later, reports also surfaced another similar attack upon a young couple, when Tunku Iskandar, together with his bodyguard, attacked them with chemicals and a mace after having offended him. Another alleged incident took place at about this time when Tunku Mahmud chained up two policemen in a dog kennel for a day after having angered him.

Five years later, Tunku Mahmud was charged and convicted of manslaughter after shooting and killing a man near his private helicopter whom he took to be a smuggler. In both cases, his father, Sultan Ismail, intervened and granted official pardons to Tunku Iskandar. Similarly, his eldest son, Tunku Ibrahim Ismail, was convicted in the 1980s of shooting dead a man in a nightclub during a feud, but was quickly pardoned.

In 1987, Sultan Iskandar was accused of causing the death of a golf caddy in Cameron Highlands by assault, following an incident in which the golf caddy laughed when the Sultan missed a hole. Tunku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia's first Prime Minister, pointed out that the Sultan (then the Agong) could not be prosecuted due to the immunity that was accorded to the rulers, yet he condemned Sultan Iskandar's actions at the same time. In the end the matter was let off without much public attention. The brother of the caddy – who also suffered injuries from the incident, being distressed from what he saw, subsequently ran amok in Kuala Lumpur and had to be quarantined in a mental hospital.

Gomez Incident
Main article: 1993 amendments to the Constitution of Malaysia#Gomez Incident
Assault
In late 1992, two separate assault cases by the Sultan himself as well as his younger son, Tunku Abdul Majid Idris, on hockey coaches culminated in the stripping of immunity of rulers from prosecution. Both cases received considerable headlines in the local and international news which was aptly dubbed as "The Gomez Incident". The incident was kicked off on 10 July 1992, when Sultan Iskandar's second son, the Tunku Bendahara–Tunku Abdul Majid Idris, lost his temper during a hockey match with the Perak hockey team after Perak won the match by a penalty stroke, and assaulted the Perak goalkeeper, Mohamed Jaafar Mohamed Vello. The goalkeeper later lodged a police report on 30 July. The incident received public attention, especially when the matter was debated in parliament. The incident resulted in the Malaysian Hockey Federation issuing Tunku Majid, (then second-in line to the throne after his elder brother) facing a ban of five years from participating in any tournaments following investigations.Tunku Majid was later convicted of assault in January 1993, of which the chief justice sentenced him to a year in prison, on top of a RM 2000 fine. He was released on a bail, and these charges were later dropped on grounds of immunity, which was still applicable at the time when the act was committed.

The Sultan responded to the ban by putting pressure on the state authorities to enforce isolation of the Johor hockey teams from all national tournaments. In November 1992, Douglas Gomez, a coach for the Maktab Sultan Abu Bakar field hockey team, expressed his displeasure of being called to withdraw from a semi-final national hockey match by the Director of the Johor Education Department. The incident attracted the attention of the Sultan, who personally summoned Gomez to his palace, Istana Bukit Serene, where he was promptly reprimanded and assaulted by the Sultan. Following Gomez's meeting with the Sultan, Gomez sought treatment to his face and stomach. Subsequently, he lodged a police report against the Sultan for assault. Gomez elaborated that the Sultan bodyguards, members of the Johor Military Force personnel, were merely onlookers, and that the Sultan was solely responsible for the injuries.

Public responses and follow ups
The assault resulted in a public outcry over the event which pressured all levels of the government right up to the top ranks of the federal government to investigate into the matter. In the closing months of 1992, and also the opening months of 1993, dozens of articles mentioning misdeeds by the royal families of several states–but in particular Sultan Iskandar himself were published. A good deal of these alleged misdeeds that were mentioned included the charging of exorbitant fines–way above the prescribed legal limits–upon offenders who had obstructed the Sultan's car, amongst others. Sultan Iskandar, nevertheless bore the brunt of the backlash by the numerous references centered towards alleged acts of criminal wrongdoings even though many of the listed acts were committed by other members of the royal family.

The vociferous spate of criticisms roused by the press prompted Members of Parliament of the Dewan Rakyat to convene a special session on 10 December 1992. All 96 parliamentarians present on that day passed a unanimous resolution which called for action to curb the powers of the rulers if necessary. During the special meeting, parliamentarians disclosed past criminal records of Sultan Iskandar and his two sons, all of whom had been involved in a total of at least 23 cases of assault and manslaughter, five of which were cases committed by the Sultan after 1981, two cases by the Tunku Mahkota and three cases by the Tunku Bendahara.

A bill was passed by both the Dewan Rakyat and Dewan Negara on 19 January and 20 January 1993 respectively. The bill, which proposed to remove legal immunity was approved by six out of nine sultans—but saw stiff opposition from three, two of which included the Ismail Petra, the Sultan of Kelantan and the Sultan Iskandar himself. Sultan Iskandar took up the initiative to obtain more royal support to stall the implementation of the proposed bill. The bill, which proposed to strip rulers and members of the royal families of legal immunity, would make them prosecutable by the law in any cases of proven criminal wrongdoings.

Sultan Iskandar organised a rally which was to be held outside the palace with the aim of garnering public support to stall the bill's implementation. However, this was cancelled after intense pressure from the government. A report made during the rally quoted Sultan Iskandar calling upon all local civil servants to boycott state and federal functions in a show of support for his motion. Meanwhile, the federal government continued to pressure the rulers into assenting to the bills, which they did after several revisions of the bill were made by the government. Following which, the proposed bill was enshrined into the Federal Constitution in March 1993.

The bill allowed rulers who violated the laws to be prosecuted, while the Sedition Act of 1948 was also amended to allow public criticism of the rulers. A special court was created–presided by the Lord President of the Federal Court–to empower and prosecute members of the rulers and immediate members of the royal household.

Aftermath

Sultan Iskandar's great-grandfather, Sultan Abu Bakar was the founder of the Johor Military Force. This picture shows his grandfather, Sultan Ibrahim.Sultan Iskandar and his family members were not prosecuted for their past violations of the law on grounds that the royal immunity was still applicable when the incidences occurred. Nevertheless, shortly after the incident, Sultan Iskandar was prompted to take steps to rehabilitate his public image, which was more or less tarnished by the incident. In a public speech shortly after the episode, the Sultan was noted to have toned down somewhat on his hardline image and appeared to be somewhat more humble, appealing to Johoreans to maintain their loyalty to him.

The Gomez incident also led to a review and proposal by the Federal Government in August 1993 to disband the Johor Military Force (JMF). However, the bill to disband the JMF was subsequently repealed by parliament.

Political
Days as the Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia (1980s)
Shortly before his election as the Yang-Di Pertuan Agong in 1983, a spate of reports alleging Sultan Iskandar's intention to launch a coup d'état by launching a state of emergency to overthrow the government circulated within political circles, which reached Mahathir himself. The Sultan was reportedly having fostered close relations with several key military personnel, including the Army chief himself. The government subsequently took action to curb constitutional loopholes within the constitution and took to task of reducing the power of royal veto in passing legislation, culminating to a constitutional crisis in late 1983. Nevertheless, during his inaugural speech as the Agong in 1984, about a month after the constitutional amendments were passed in parliament, Sultan Iskandar voiced public support for the revised constitution and pledged to act in accordance to the Prime Minister's advise.

A diplomatic scandal between the United Kingdom and Malaysia broke out in 1984, when several British newspapers published pieces on Sultan Iskandar's coronation, citing the headlines such as "Killer becomes King" and "King a Killer", which enraged the Malaysian government, who demanded an apology from the British government. The British government refused to apologise on behalf of the newspapers, hence triggering tensions between the two countries. Two months later, in June 1984, Sultan Iskandar in his capacity as the Agong, surprised the Malaysian public when he publicly called upon the then-Deputy Prime Minister, Musa Hitam, to make a public apology in front of the entire congregation present at the National Mosque. Sultan Iskandar, on his part, was angry over remarks which Musa made during the course of the 1983 constitutional crisis that he deemed to be disrespectful. Musa abided to the Agong's demand and boldly came forward to make the apology, which was greeted by a thunderous applause from the entire congregation. The event, which was broadcast live throughout the nation on Malaysian Radio (although the television stations abruptly terminated its broadcast halfway), was seen by many observers as an act of confrontation by the Agong to put Musa in his place.

In 1988, also serving in his capacity as the Yang-Di Pertuan Agong, the Lord President of the Federal Court Tun Salleh Abas was sacked by the Agong in what led to the 1988 Malaysian constitutional crisis. However, observers suggested a remarkably warm relationship between then-Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamad with the Agong, both of whom shared common resentment against the chief justice, Salleh Abas. In 1973, Tunku Iskandar was convicted of assault and was sentenced to six months imprisonment, of which Salleh Abas served as the public prosecutor hearing the case. As the public prosecutor, Salleh had appealed to the chief justice, Raja Azlan Shah (now the Sultan of Perak), for handing down a heavier sentence for Tunku Iskandar, which naturally earned his wrath. The sacking of the Lord President, was however not without controversy, given the alleged manner in which the Agong and Prime Minister had handled the matter–including an incident which the Agong had refused to forgive the Lord President in spite of Salleh's willingness to offer his apology to the Agong, which he turned down.

Later years (2000 onwards)
Sultan Iskandar's public call to support Abdullah Badawi's administration in October 2006 created a minor stir among Mahathir's supporters, when he remarked that "Mahathir should act like a pensioner". The call came at a time when Mahathir's spate of criticisms against Abdullah's were at its most vociferous period.[115] The Sultan was the first state ruler to publicly defend the policy of the government during the period of Mahathir's criticisms against the Abdullah administration.[116] Earlier sources however, noted Sultan Iskandar's concerns with the deepening rift between Mahathir and Abdullah and had asked to be photographed together with the two leaders during the United Malays National Organisations (UMNO) 60th anniversary celebrations in Johor Bahru.

A month later, in November 2006, another small stir erupted during the launching ceremony of the Iskandar Development Region, when Sultan Iskandar voiced his opinion that the Causeway, which connects Johor and Singapore, should be removed to allow ships to pass through and promoting development of the state. He also remarked that the people should be wary of all foreigners as they were "vultures" and also urged the people not to hold them in high regard, citing his displeasure that his ancestors were "deceived" by dirty tactics employed by colonialists to build the Causeway.

At the inaugural 12th Johor State Assembly Seating in April 2008, a minor controversy erupted when one opposition member of parliament (MP), Gwee Tong Hiang, flouted dress regulations by appearing in a lounge suit and tie instead of the usual official attire and songkok. This resulted in him being dismissed from the assembly chamber shortly before the Sultan's arrival. Gwee, a Democratic Action Party (DAP) MP, reportedly argued that there was no stated order to wear the official attire and songkok and stated his desire to wear a western suit, promptly drew flak from other MPs and the Menteri Besar, Abdul Ghani Othman who had earlier on met to agree to don in the official attire and songkok prior to the assembly, whereby Gwee was absent. The Sultan, apparently angry at Gwee, sharply criticised him two days later and publicly called upon Gwee to seek an audience with him.