JULY 23 — The Malaysian Chinese electorate has, for decades, shown that it is capable of engaging with coalition politics in a pragmatic manner.
History demonstrates that Malaysian Chinese voters have worked with the Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA) as a founding component of Barisan Nasional and, before that, the Alliance.
They have also, at different moments, accepted political arrangements involving PAS under leaders such as the late Fadzil Noor and Datuk Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat.
In other words, cooperation with PAS as a political party has never been the central issue.
The more difficult question today is whether cooperation with a PAS led by Tan Sri Abdul Hadi Awang is viewed in the same way.
That distinction matters.
MCA has produced many leaders who earned respect across the political spectrum. Tan Cheng Lock laid the foundations of inter-ethnic cooperation in independent Malaya.
Lee San Choon, Tan Koon Swan, Neo Yee Pan, Lee Kim Sai, Ling Liong Sik, Chua Soi Lek, Ong Tee Keat, Liow Tiong Lai and now Wee Ka Siong have each contributed to Malaysian politics in different ways.
Among contemporary leaders, Wee Ka Siong stands out for his mastery of parliamentary debate, command of facts and figures, and his fluent use of the Malay language.
His ability to engage across ethnic and political lines reflects a long Malaysian tradition of coalition politics.
Yet politics changed significantly after July 13, when Hadi Awang publicly acknowledged directing PAS supporters to “top up” the vote banks of MCA and MIC during the Johor state election.
That statement immediately shifted the political conversation.
It was no longer merely about electoral cooperation. It became a question of what such cooperation might ultimately signify.
Hadi Awang is one of Malaysia’s most influential political figures. His leadership has shaped PAS for more than two decades.
Throughout that period, PAS has entered and exited multiple political alliances—working with Umno, then opposing it, joining Pakatan Rakyat, leaving it, cooperating with Bersatu, and later rebuilding ties with Umno.
Agriculture and Food Security Minister Datuk Seri Mohamad Sabu aptly described this pattern as one of “marriage, divorce, and marriage again.”
Such political flexibility is not, by itself, unusual. Coalition politics everywhere requires negotiation and compromise.
What concerns many voters is something different.
For many Malaysian Chinese, and indeed many Malaysians from Sabah and Sarawak, the issue is less about PAS as an Islamist party than about the political style associated with Hadi Awang’s leadership.
Whether PAS agrees with this assessment is beside the point.
Politics is often driven as much by perception as by policy.
Among many voters, Hadi’s public speeches have increasingly been interpreted as placing greater emphasis on religious identity than on civic inclusion.
His political messaging has often been seen as directed primarily towards consolidating one segment of the electorate rather than reassuring Malaysia’s wider multicultural society.
Equally significant is the perception that little effort has been made to directly engage the unique concerns of Sabah and Sarawak, whose political cultures differ substantially from those in Peninsular Malaysia.
East Malaysian voters have consistently defended a more plural understanding of the Federation, making any perceived narrowing of Malaysia’s political space especially sensitive.
Whether this perception is entirely fair is open to debate.
Its electoral consequences, however, are real.
This explains why cooperation between MCA and Umno is often viewed differently from cooperation involving a Hadi-led PAS.
Umno and MCA have governed together for decades within a political framework that works.
Voters understand that collaboration; even when they reject it, occasionally, at the ballot box. As and when 1MDB issues was too unsavory to fathom.
The fact is a closer association with a Hadi-led PAS introduces greater uncertainty.
Many voters naturally ask what such cooperation would mean for future public policy ?
Indeed, the constitutional balance, inter-communal relations and Malaysia’s international reputation as a moderate trading nation too.
These are legitimate political questions in any democracy.
They do not imply that PAS supporters are acting in bad faith, nor do they deny PAS the democratic right to seek power through elections.
Likewise, every political party—including MCA—has every constitutional right to cooperate with whichever partner it believes best advances its objectives.
The electorate enjoys an equally important right: to decide whether those alliances deserve endorsement.
That judgment becomes particularly significant in the Negeri Sembilan state election.
Malaysia is currently performing relatively well economically, with strong growth and contained inflation.
Political stability remains one of the country’s greatest comparative advantages in attracting investment, sustaining exports and preserving confidence during a period of heightened geopolitical uncertainty stretching from the Red Sea to the Strait of Hormuz.
Many voters therefore evaluate electoral alliances not merely through ideology but also through their potential impact on national stability.
The debate is consequently much larger than MCA or PAS alone.
It concerns the kind of political equilibrium Malaysians wish to preserve as the country navigates an increasingly turbulent international environment.
Ultimately, the issue is not whether MCA can cooperate with PAS.
It clearly can.
The more important question is whether enough Malaysians—including Malaysian Chinese, East Malaysians and many moderate Malay voters—are prepared to endorse cooperation with a PAS led by Abdul Hadi Awang.
That answer cannot be supplied by politicians, commentators or opinion polls alone.
It can only be determined by voters themselves when they cast their ballots in Negeri Sembilan.
In every democracy, electoral alliances are ultimately judged not in press conferences but at the ballot box. The verdict belongs to the people, and to the people alone.
• Phar Kim Beng is a professor of Asean Studies and a director at the Institute of International and Asean Studies, International Islamic University Malaysia.
** This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.
