Today I visited the independent Malaysian radio station BFM 89.9, along with Kean Wong, Contributing Editor on the Malaysian election campaign at New Mandala, to give an interview on the political tactics of both sides during the GE14 and point out which issues people should be paying attention to. The full podcast can be heard through their website, linked above.
Unlikely allies: longstanding opposition figure Wan Azizah (left) with former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad (second from right) after Malaysia’s opposition named Mahathir as its candidate for prime minister (Photo: Fazry Ismail/EPA).
Today Inside Story published an essay of mine on the rise of Mahathir Mohamad to leader of the Pakatan Harapan coalition opposition parties at the age of 92. I discuss Malaysia’s current political faultlines and why Mahathir is now allying himself with former nemesis Anwar Ibrahim.
“It’s hard to think of a more surprising political turnaround. This week former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad announced that he will contest this year’s general election as leader of an alliance of opposition parties committed to ousting the government of Najib Razak. It was Mahathir who chose Najib back in 2009 to lead his former party, UMNO, and the coalition it has headed since the 1970s, Barisan Nasional. In taking the candidacy, the former PM allies himself with his one-time colleague and later nemesis Anwar Ibrahim, whom he famously sacked from the deputy prime ministership in 1998.
Mahathir, who rose through UMNO’s ranks to become prime minister in 1981, is ninety-two years old. His decision to stand this year has raised questions about the state of politics in a nation where the median age is only twenty-eight. Malaysian and international media outlets alike have reflected the view that Mahathir’s selection to lead the coalition is “laughable.”
For answers to this apparent paradox, though, look not to the nation’s age profile but to the calculus of building electoral coalitions in a diverse nation that still bears the scars of the political battles of the past two decades. Look also to Mahathir’s singular success in building coalitions over even more decades, using a combination of Malay nationalism, an Islamist ethic favouring entrepreneurship and capitalist development, and selective minority representation. In combination with favours for allies and civil and judicial pressure on opponents, his use of these themes has been masterful.
ABC News interview: discussing Mahathir Mohamad’s bid for PM at 92 years of age and the calculations informing this choice (Photo: ABC News Twitter).
Today I gave an interview to ABC News on the current state of politics in Malaysia. I told the ABC’s Del Irani that Installing Mahathir as a Pakatan figurehead is a move full of intent, aimed at rewinding Malaysian politics back to the 1990s days of the ‘real’ Barisan Nasional – led by Mahathir and Anwar – and organised as a multi-racial coalition, not a seemingly Malay Muslim bloc.
The decision aims to neutralise voter concerns in two directions; on the one hand it reassures Malay Muslims that there is no threat against them from either minorities or Islamists in the form of PAS; and on the other, it reassures liberal and non-Muslims that there remains a political bulwark against stronger Islamisation in the future.
I also touch on Mahathir’s age and the party’s plans for succession, and the remarkable history of the Anwar and Mahathir relationship.
Former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad talks to journalists in Malaysia’s administrative capital, Putrajaya, earlier this month. Ahmad Yusni/EPA, selected by Inside Story.
Today, the excellent website Inside Story published my latest essay on the strategy and tactics of Dr Mahathir’s entry into Pakatan Harapan. I discuss the way the opposition parties wish to convert FELDA’s problems into a mini-1MDB crisis for rural voters in critical seats.
Image: Former US Attorney-General Loretta E. Lynch addressing Washington journalists over the Department of Justice investigation into funds misappropriated from state development fund 1MDB. Photo: Reuters/James Lawler Duggan, selected by East Asia Forum.
Today, I published a second op-ed in a series of two pieces featured by East Asia Forum, this time looking forward to how international developments might make life difficult for Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, especially if they are capitalised on politically by the opposition alliance headed by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
The full text of the opinion piece is below.
The international fallout from Najib’s 1MDB scandal
Author: Amrita Malhi, ANU
The international consequences of Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s handling of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal will likely continue to escalate. The affair concerns US$800 million from the development fund that investigators believe to have passed through Najib’s personal bank accounts, in addition to other funds believed to have moved through foreign intermediaries and investment vehicles.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. Imaged selected by East Asia Forum.
Today, I published a summary in East Asia Forum of the domestic politics surrounding Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak at the end of 2016.
Najib might seem to have sealed up every institution he can access to ensure he cannot be toppled, but he still needs to ensure that his Barisan Nasional government can outmanoeuvre the opposition alliance with former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad at its helm.
This is because it is no longer enough for successive Barisan governments to simply win electoral contests that are designed to deliver victory to them in any case, they also need to ensure they rule with a modicum of legitimacy.
The full text of the article is below.
Najib fights to retain control after 1MDB scandal
Author: Amrita Malhi, ANU As 2016 draws to a close, Najib Razak remains Malaysia’s prime minister. This is despite two years of scandal, scrutiny and speculation over funds missing from state development fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), including US$800 million that is believed to have passed through his personal bank accounts.
Najib quickly shut down Malaysian investigations into 1MDB in 2015. Yet external agencies and media sources have since tracked what they believe is an international chain of transactions enabling billions to allegedly be siphoned out of the fund, through foreign banks, funds, shell companies and the prime minister’s personal contacts.
Mahathir (left) and Anwar (Photo: Reuters).
My thoughts have been included in a great piece by Holly Robertson in the Southeast Asia Globe on the unlikely renewed alliance between Anwar Ibrahim and Mahathir Mohamad, an alliance born of both men agreeing that their much larger, mutual problem of Prime Minister Najib Razak is worth combining forces over.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak speaks at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin, Germany, 27 September 2016. (Photo: EPA/Bernd Von Jutrczenka)
I was happy to give Logan Connor some comments for his article today in the Southeast Asia Globe, which talked about Najib using social welfare programs in the 2017 budget as a way to salvage his damaged reputation. You can read the full article here, and I’ve put my contribution below.
“Najib’s reputation has certainly been dented, yet it appears he is taking the view that offence is the best defence. It seems he will campaign on a mixture of issues related to Malay Muslim uplift, such as social welfare and mobility, and Malay Muslim unity.”
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. Image selected by New Mandala.
The fourth and final part of my New Mandala series drawing on an interview with former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad can be found below. An abridged version was published in the Canberra Times and syndicated across Fairfax media websites online.
Financial scandals and foreign affairs
If Malaysia’s political impasse breaks, the impact may be global.
“I myself have never wanted foreign interference in our domestic affairs,” former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad declared in late June in his Putrajaya office. “But domestic means of redress have been closed.”
Since I spoke to him then there’s been much debate between Malaysia analysts on whether current PM Najib Razak’s position is safe, and how much longer he can hold on before the cluster of problems now assembled around him ends his political career. Today, the ANU Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs hosts the 2016 Malaysia Update largely focused on this debate.
This is an important question, not only for Malaysia but for Australia. Analysts in Asia continue to argue that Najib is unassailable, based on their analysis of formal UMNO structures and the Malaysian bureaucracy. Mahathir largely concurs in his assessment of Najib’s domestic prospects, saying “the AG [Attorney-General] will not take up the case against him in the court.
Image: Book cover for Ibrahim Ali’s The Misunderstood Man.
I’ve spent the day involved with the Malaysia Update, a day of talks hosted by the ANU Coral Bell School of Asia-Pacific Affairs.
Highlights included a panel on gender and women in politics featuring members of parliament Fuziah Saleh and Alice Lau, which I chaired, and talks by Azrul Mohd Khalid from IDEAS and Ibrahim Ali from PERKASA.
More information, along with a full program, is available from the ANU website.