Graft and gridlock: in Anwar’s Malaysia, reformist cracks widen

Two votes. That was the margin by which Malaysia’s prime minister, a man with a supermajority in the 222-seat lower house, failed to pass a bill his own coalition had spent weeks publicly championing. After the numbers were read out, the cameras cut to Anwar Ibrahim. He was mid-laugh, chatting with his deputy. The bill, defeated on March 2, was supposed to be a quick win – a term-limit proposal capping any prime minister at two terms or 10 years in office, chosen precisely because it was popular, symbolically loaded and politically safe. But instead of a clean win to silence the growing chorus of critics who say Anwar’s reform agenda has stalled, it fell just shy of the two-thirds majority required. “It was really disappointing,” said a lawmaker from Anwar’s Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition, asking not to be named. “That bill should have easily passed. It feels like there was not enough effort to make sure everyone turned up.” The government has pledged to reintroduce the bill in June. Leaders of the key parties in Anwar’s unity government have promised their MPs will actually attend this time. But promising to get it right the second time is not much of a rallying cry. Cracks in the coalition More than halfway through his five-year term, Anwar finds himself caught in a confluence of crises – some inherited, many self-inflicted – with a general election due no later than early 2028. His core supporters are restless. His coalition partners are breaking ranks. A flagship anti-corruption body is mired in scandal. And Umno, the party that dominated Malaysian politics for six decades before voters ousted it in 2018, is manoeuvring for a comeback. The warning signs had been building for months. In November’s Sabah state poll, they became impossible to ignore. Pakatan Harapan was routed and coalition partner the Democratic Action Party (DAP) – the political standard-bearer for Malaysia’s ethnic Chinese minority – lost every single seat it contested. Eight contests, eight defeats. The result was a jolt. DAP leaders who had spent years working from inside government began reaching back to the combative reform language of their opposition years, demanding the coalition accelerate delivery on long-standing promises. They have since gone as far as threatening to resign from Anwar’s cabinet if their own party delegates demand it at a special congress in July. “Everyone is panicking now,” a coalition insider, speaking on condition of anonymity, told This Week in Asia. “The fact that the DAP lost in all eight seats it contested in Sabah means PH is losing the Chinese vote.” Everyone is panicking now Pakatan Harapan insider This was why DAP leaders were “suddenly going back to old rhetoric”, the insider added – to pressure the prime minister “to speed up delivery on all the reforms” he promised. The failed vote on the term limit bill landed in that already-charged atmosphere. The following day, the government quietly pulled a second reform bill – one seeking to separate the powers of the attorney general and the public prosecutor – and referred it to a parliamentary select committee for further refinement. PH lawmakers blamed the opposition for the bill’s defeat, while the opposition pointed out that their votes should not have mattered if the government truly held a two-thirds majority. Self-inflicted wounds It didn’t have to be this way, according to Tricia Yeoh, an associate professor at the University of Nottingham Malaysia’s School of Politics and International Relations. “By addressing some of these institutional failures early on in his term, he could have escaped some of these problems, which are arguably self-inflicted,” she said. Among the most glaring examples is Anwar’s unfulfilled promise to hand parliament the power to appoint the head of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), a reform specifically designed to insulate the watchdog from political interference. That failure now looks particularly costly. The MACC is at the centre of an escalating scandal, with allegations that its officers colluded with a “corporate mafia” to pressure business rivals into accepting deals or selling their shares. At the same time, MACC Chief Commissioner Azam Baki has been accused of illicit shareholdings, with critics portraying him as the enforcer of a politically motivated anti-corruption operation aimed squarely at Anwar’s enemies. Azam’s tenure has been extended three times under Anwar’s watch, even as coalition allies and civil society groups that once championed his reform cause repeatedly urged the prime minister to act on earlier pledges to remove him. Over that same period, the commission mounted high-profile operations against two-time former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, his family and close associates: figures who for decades had been considered untouchable. Chief Secretary to the Government Shamsul Azri Abu Bakar said on Tuesday that authorities would meet “soon” to review the findings of a special task force investigating the shareholding allegations. The cumulative effect has been to undercut the very credibility Anwar sought to build. What was billed as a landmark anti-corruption effort now carries, for many observers, an asterisk – one that asks whose corruption, exactly, is being fought. The Rafizi rupture Then there is Rafizi Ramli. The former economy minister – one of the chief architects of Anwar’s 2022 election victory – is now under MACC investigation over an alleged abuse of power linked to a 1.1 billion ringgit (US$280 million) government deal with British semiconductor firm Arm Holdings. Rafizi has denied wrongdoing, but the inquiry has done its work politically. Last May, he resigned from the cabinet following a contentious internal election that elevated Anwar’s eldest daughter, Nurul Izzah, to deputy president of the prime minister’s People’s Justice Party (PKR). The two men have traded pointed public remarks ever since. Last month, Rafizi said he would announce his “political direction” in June – widely seen as a signal that he might launch his own party. If he does, it would carve directly into Anwar’s base at the worst possible moment. “The larger risks for Anwar are more likely to come from within the system rather than external shocks,” said Syaza Farhana Mohamad Shukri, head of the political science department at the International Islamic University of Malaysia. “The political environment is shifting, especially as [Anwar’s] coalition partners position themselves for the next general election.” The Umno factor Yet perhaps the most consequential threat to Anwar’s prospects comes from a direction few would have predicted three years ago. Umno entered Anwar’s unity government in 2022 from a position of historic weakness. Having been swept from power in 2018 amid public fury over the multibillion-dollar 1MDB scandal, the party won just 27 seats in the last general election. Anwar needed them nonetheless, as his surest route to credibility among Malaysia’s Malay majority. Umno is not acting like a junior partner any more. Last week, it convened eight Malay political parties to discuss the political future of Malaysia’s ethnic majority, filling a vacuum that the prime minister has conspicuously failed to address. Then came the confirmation from party insiders: Umno is reportedly to contest 115 seats at the coming election. Proof, if it were needed, that the party has stopped thinking about survival and started thinking about power. “Seven years ago everybody laughed and wrote Umno and Zahid off,” said a senior party leader, speaking anonymously and referring to party president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who also happens to be Anwar’s deputy prime minister. “Now they are scared.” Umno is both the solution and the problem. Without its Malay-majority backing, any reform effort becomes easy prey for an opposition that has shown no hesitation in reaching for the race card. With it, reform is held hostage by a party that has little interest in fundamental change. “Any reform measures could easily be turned into a racial issue, especially by the opposition,” said Adib Zalkapli, managing director of geopolitical and public affairs firm Viewfinder Global Affairs. “So Anwar has to walk a fine line between keeping his core supporters satisfied and preventing the opposition from weaponising his reform agenda along racial lines.” Umno is not expected to win enough seats to govern alone. But analysts do not see any other party doing so either. “Malaysia could very well be heading towards another hung parliament,” said Asrul Sani, associate vice-president with strategic advisory and business consulting firm The Asia Group. “This means the real contest may not be about who wins outright, but who is able to assemble the broadest governing coalition.” The term-limit bill, if it finally passes in June, will cap any future prime minister at two terms. Whether Anwar gets a second one is anyone’s guess.

Graft and gridlock: in Anwar’s Malaysia, reformist cracks widen

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Malaysia’s prime minister can’t pass his own reform bills. His coalition appears to be cracking – and time is running out

Malaysia’s prime minister can’t pass his own reform bills. His coalition appears to be cracking – and time is running out