The Evolution of Coalition Politics in Malaysia

 By Henry Srebrnik, [Moncton, NB]  Times & Transcript

Malaysia’s fourteenth general election in November 2022 produced a 19-party coalition government led by Anwar Ibrahim’s multiethnic Alliance of Hope (Pakatan Harapan, PH) grouping. It is itself a four-party organization, and it now controls a two-thirds parliamentary majority.

Self-styled as the “Unity Government,” this new political movement also contains the once-dominant National Front (Barisan Nasional, BN), a four-entity coalition under the leadership of the United Malays National Organization (Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Bersatu, UMNO); they were the outgoing government. It also includes the four-grouping Sarawak Parties Alliance (Gabungan Parti Sarawak, GPS); and the three-unit Sabah People’s Alliance (Gabungan Rakyat Sabah, GRS).

The ruling coalition also has four standalone parties, the Heritage Party (Parti Warisan), the youth-based Malaysian United Democratic Alliance (MUDA) and two regional parties.

The most charismatic opposition leader the southeast Asian nation has ever seen, Anwar led tens of thousands of Malaysians in street protests in the 1990s against his mentor-turned-foe Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

Mahathir once called Anwar his friend and protege and anointed him his successor. But later, amid sodomy charges and disagreements over how to handle the Asian financial crisis, he said Anwar was unfit to lead “because of his character.”

Holding one-third of federal seats, the opposition, the predominantly Malay-Muslim National Alliance (Pakatan Nasional, PN), which is itself a four-party coalition, challenges the new government from an ethnic flank position. So the evolution of coalition politics in Malaysia continues, as national coalitions proliferate, while politics in Sabah and Sarawak on the island of Borneo denationalize.

The result has had significant implications. First, it led to the fourth peaceful transfer of power since the end of the BN’s 61-year rule in 2018, even though Malaysia’s democracy is far from consolidated. It also recorded the unprecedented rise of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (Parti Islam Se-Malaysia, PAS), which became the largest single party in parliament.

Driven by the PAS and Malaysian United Indigenous Party (Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia, PPBM), the PN is now the sole Opposition with one-third of the seats. Also, only three of Malaysia’s 13 states had their elections concurrently, ending the conventional vertical and horizontal simultaneity in the election calendar, indicating the decoupling of federal-state politics since 2018.

The PAS, long a powerhouse in northeastern parts of Malaysia, has become a national force by winning the most seats of any party: 49 of the 222, 19 per cent of the seats, and nearly triple its tally in the last election in 2018.

The new popularity of the PAS is also partly a result of the decline of the long-dominant UMNO, for generations the party of choice for Malays. The UMNO, which held a monopoly over the country’s politics since independence, has been plagued by rivalry between party warlords. It led its worst electoral results in its history, winning only 26 seats.

The UMNO faces a steep uphill battle as it seeks to rebuild its image as the champion of the majority Malay Muslims while at the same time adjusting to the new reality of its minority role in the federal unity government -- ahead of six state elections that could determine the group’s continued relevance on the country’s political stage.

The PAS has banned cinemas and advocated caning as a punishment for homosexuality in states that it runs and it put its religious appeals front and centre in the election, with one leader saying voters would “go to hell” if they voted for Anwar’s coalition.

Malaysian politics has always been centred on coalitions due to the needs of inter-ethnic power-sharing and vote-pooling under the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) electoral system. However, the number of serious coalitions has grown over the decades.

The two-coalition system Malaysian democrats aspired to establish after 1990 was one consisting of two multi-ethnic coalitions competing centripetally, resembling the British two-party system. However, a multiethnic-monoethnic binary competition has emerged as the new two-coalition format since 2018 after the BN’s defeat in 2018. Malaysia’s three coalition governments since 2020 resemble shifting coalitions rather than the permanent coalitions of Malaysia’s early years did.

Meanwhile, the Borneo states of Sabah and Sarawak have their own regional party systems, which feature regional coalitions, national coalitions and standalone regional parties.

Except for those in the PN, all coalitions and parties holding federal seats in Sabah and Sarawak are now partners in Anwar’s 19-party government, but many remain competitors to each other at the state-level. Dominated by strongmen and fuelled by patronage, regional parties on Borneo can realign and move in and out of coalitions at ease, creating instability.

Anwar, who is ethnic Malay and Muslim, addressed race and religion in his first news conference as prime minister, promising to uphold Islam as the official religion of the country and the rights of the ethnic Malay majority, while also safeguarding the rights of all.

Race and religion are thorny issues in Malaysia, where Muslim ethnic Malays form a majority in a country with significant ethnic Chinese and ethnic Indian minorities, most of them Hindu, Buddhist or Christian.

As the biggest party in parliament, the PAS could push for Islamisation and more affirmative action for Malays -- a long-standing policy that Anwar has opposed, analysts indicate. The PAS could also play up its religious credentials to distinguish itself from other Malay-centric parties, they say.