Anwar Ibrahim has work cut out as Malaysian PM

THERE is every chance that the newly-minted Malaysian prime minister will have an even more exacting time in successfully running the country for the next five years, than the previous 24 Anwar Ibrahim spent trying to get into the office.

To begin with, he will be presiding over a fractious coalition of alliances, each partner pushing its own agenda. The formerly dominant Umno (which leads the Barisan Nasional alliance) can be reasonably expected to mount campaigns that would ensure it regains the trust of Malay voters. And Anwar’s Sarawak partners want even more state autonomy than they enjoy now, this time over education and health matters.

Then it has to be noted, Anwar is really the junior partner within his own Pakatan Harapan (PH) alliance; the Chinese-based Democratic Action Party (DAP) has the most party seats. The DAP will demand things that rub hard against the demands from his other partner, Umno, especially in these times of post-Covid and Ukraine war-induced economic uncertainty. And all the while, the opposition Perikatan Nasional, of which the theocratic Parti Islam SeMalaysia (PAS) is the senior partner, will seek to remind Anwar at every turn that he rules without the consent of the majority Malay-Muslim voters, given that PAS garnered the most seats of any single party, all at the expense of Umno.