KUALA LUMPUR, April 13 — Pakatan Harapan (PH) chairman Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has a big challenge for the coming elections in six states, and that is to increase the coalition’s Malay vote bank, former minister Khairy Jamaluddin Abu Bakar said.
Sacked from Umno in January, Khairy who is now a visiting scholar at the ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore wrote an article predicting that the odds were stacked against PH in winning the three PAS-led states of Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu.
“These elections will lay bare Anwar’s greatest challenge — increasing his coalition’s vote share in the Malay ground,” the former Umno Youth chief wrote in Fulcrum, a Singapore-based publication that published the article yesterday under the title “Anwar’s Coalition Government: Navigating Tricky Undercurrents”.
Khairy noted that several analysts, whom he did not name, have put PH’s Malay vote share during the general elections last year at less than 15 per cent.
“Going into the state elections at these levels, it will be impossible for Anwar to secure any of the northern states especially, and he will have to keep an eye on his own strongholds, especially Selangor,” he wrote.
He said that Malaysia’s political landscape has changed greatly since the 15th general election last November.
Back then, PH and its rival coalition Perikatan Nasional (PN) — of which PAS is a component party — were at a stalemate as neither side had enough wins for a simple 112-seat majority to form government.
But through intense negotiation with several other political coalitions and the intervention of the Conference of Rulers, Anwar was finally appointed prime minister, beating out PN chairman Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.
Khairy said that PN has now identified Selangor and Negeri Sembilan as the two key battlegrounds in the coming state elections.
He added that while the Opposition coalition is still unlikely to take over Selangor, it has a chance to win 12 out of the 56 state seats, with PH likely to keep 41.
He calculated that in Negeri Sembilan, PN could bag two out of 36 state seats, with PH taking 18 while the Barisan Nasional (BN) taking the remaining 16.
“But Perikatan Nasional’s chances can be boosted if they secure prominent and popular ‘poster boy/girl’ candidates offered as potential leaders of the states should they win.
“Furthermore, the political undercurrents currently being felt in Malaysia may gain strength and threaten Anwar’s stability if he and his allies cannot successfully navigate through them,” Khairy wrote.
He said PN has been borrowing from “Anwar’s playbook” in the run-up to the state elections now that it has become the Opposition, by championing populist campaigns such as pushing Malaysians to be allowed to make withdrawals from their retirement funds.
Khairy said that Anwar also has to deal with the Umno “headache”.
Though Umno is now a PH ally, Khairy said Anwar is being weighed down by his old friend Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi who is now the Malay nationalist party president and deputy prime minister.
Khairy – who had openly challenged Zahid’s leadership of Umno during and after GE15 – labeled the Bagan Datuk MP a “deadweight” for Anwar.
“Anwar’s political capital is taking a hit, given Zahid’s controversial reputation and the impression that he is rewarding his supporters and cronies unchecked. “Of greater concern to Anwar is if Umno becomes an electoral liability during the state polls,” Khairy wrote.
He added that Anwar also has to contend with former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak who remains an influential political figure despite being imprisoned for his crimes in the SRC International Sdn Bhd saga.
“Najib’s supporters, which make up at least half of Umno’s ruling council, have launched a petition to support his pardon. “They also have launched an assault on the judiciary by leaking investigation documents against the trial judge that convicted him,” Khairy wrote.
The former Health minister noted that Zahid has told Umno to formally petition the King for Najib’s pardon.
Khairy said that Anwar’s support may crumble if the PM fails to defend the judiciary against the ongoing smear campaign against the SRC trial judge who convicted Najib.
