Appointed Prime Minister on November 24 by King Abdullah, the constitutional monarch of the Malaysian federation, Anwar Ibrahim gets his revenge: it took twenty years of political battles, ten of which were spent in prison, for this Malay Muslim, aged 75, champion of the reformasi movement which has been advocating a multicultural and more inclusive Malaysia since the 2000s, has entered Putrajaya, the seat of government, south of Kuala Lumpur.
The Sultan of Pahang – one of the nine sultans who succeed each other every five years at the head of the state – entrusted Mr. Anwar with the mission of forming a “unity government” in the absence of a majority among the three major coalitions in contention at the end of the elections on 19th November. That of Mr. Anwar, called the “coalition of hope” (Pakatan Harapan), the first in number of seats, benefited from the rallying of the National Organization of Malay Unity (UMNO), the historic ruling party, as well as parts of the island of Borneo. The new prime minister has indicated his desire to submit his future government to a vote of confidence on 19 December.
Anwar will have to lead this multi-ethnic country of 33 million inhabitants, a former “baby tiger” of the world economy today in crisis of growth (Malaysia is in 6e rank of the ten economies of Southeast Asia), beyond the era of large-scale mismanagement and perpetual reversals of alliance (two prime ministers succeeded each other during the Covid). The two emblematic figures of the five years that are ending are now offside: Najib Razak, the former prime minister accused of having embezzled money from the sovereign fund, has been in prison since August. And Mahathir, 97, the ex-autocrat from 1981 to 2003, who returned to power between 2018 and 2020 after joining the opposition, and therefore Mr. Anwar’s camp, before their breakup, won no seats. .
big cleaning
The challenges facing Mr. Anwar are daunting: to carry out the great clean-up of the UMNO era demanded by his electorate while dealing with this obligatory partner to govern, and its currents. The current leader of UMNO, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, in favor of rallying to Anwar, is contested within his party. He is also subject to several legal proceedings for breach of trust, corruption and money laundering.
His movement wants to make the positive discrimination system that favors the Malay ethnic group fairer
The other long-term promise of the “reformasi” is to make the system of positive discrimination fairer, which favors the majority Malay ethnic group, to the detriment of the Chinese (23% of the population) and Indian (7%) and breeds corruption and incompetence. However, a whole section of the electorate showed its reluctance by granting a record number of seats (49, the best score for a single party) to a fundamentalist formation, the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), which is campaigning for the strengthening Sharia, Islamic law. The PAS belongs to the coalition led by former Prime Minister Muhyiddin (2020-2021), now in opposition.
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