Malaysia’s new king, a 47-year-old state sultan, ascended the throne on 13th Dec, becoming one of the youngest constitutional monarch in the Southeast Asian nation’s history.
Sultan Muhammad V took his oath of office in a nationally televised ceremony in Malaysia’s federal palace.
Under a unique system maintained since Malaysia’s independence from Britain in 1957, nine hereditary state rulers take turns as the country’s king for five-year terms.
The monarch’s role is largely ceremonial, since administrative power is vested in the Prime Minister and Parliament.
He is highly regarded, particularly among the ethnic Malay Muslim majority, as the supreme upholder of Malay tradition and symbolic head of Islam.
