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By Anuradha Raghu March 2, 2020, 5:42 PM GMT+8 Updated on March 3, 2020, 5:41 PM GMT+8
Malaysia’s first transfer of power in six decades was hailed as a milestone for transparency, free speech and racial tolerance in the multiethnic Southeast Asian state. Two years later the young coalition collapsed amid an all-too-familiar mix of political intrigue and horse trading that stems in part from an entrenched system of affirmative action policies that critics say fosters cronyism and identity-based politics. The political upheaval has brought back elements of the old regime into a shaky new government that is confronted with public discontent over a weakening economy, just as the coronavirus outbreak hobbles the country’s main trading partner, China.
1. Why did tensions boil over?
Two veteran politicians, Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim, pulled off a shocking election victory in 2018 that ousted then-Prime Minister Najib Razak, who was enmeshed in a massive money-laundering scandal linked to the state investment firm 1MDB. Mahathir, now 94, became prime minister again (he held the post from 1981 to 2003), with the understanding that he would hand over to Anwar at some point. Delays in setting a date — as well as policy disputes within the unwieldy coalition — led to tension that boiled over in late February. Mahathir abruptly stepped down and became interim prime minister. He then sought to strengthen his hand by forming a unity government outside party politics. But the king pre-empted his efforts on March 1 by naming Mahathir’s erstwhile right-hand man, Muhyiddin Yassin, as Malaysia’s eighth prime minister since independence from the U.K. in 1957.
2. There’s a king?
Malaysia is a parliamentary democracy along the lines of the U.K., except instead of one constitutional monarch the title rotates every five years among the rulers of nine Malay states. The king, known as the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, usually stays on the sidelines performing ceremonial duties, but is involved in major appointments like that of prime minister.
3. Who is Muhyiddin?
A 72-year-old career politician who rose through ranks of the once-ruling United Malays National Organisation party. He was Najib’s deputy for six years before he was sacked in July 2015 after calling for greater clarity in the 1MDB investigations. He later joined forces with Mahathir to set up a new party, Bersatu, and became home affairs minister in the new government. A cancer survivor who’s generally low-profile, he’s perhaps best known for quipping in 2010 that he considers himself “Malay first” and Malaysian second.
4. What does ‘Malay first’ mean?
Some 56% of the country’s 31 million people are ethnic Malay (defined in the constitution as Muslim), and another 13% belong to other indigenous groups, according to 2019 estimates from the Department of Statistics Malaysia. Collectively they are known as bumiputera, or “sons of the soil.” There are also large ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities who are Christian, Buddhist and Hindu. Government policies give preferential treatment to bumiputera, traditionally seen as disenfranchised, in such areas as public-sector jobs, housing and higher education. Critics say the preferences have fostered cronyism and a dependence on state handouts and have prompted many educated minorities to look for work overseas, draining the economy of talent. But they are something of a “third rail” in Malaysia’s polarized politics. Mahathir’s appointment of Lim Guan Eng as finance minister, the first ethnic Chinese to hold the post in over four decades, sowed suspicion among Malay nationalists that their benefits would be eroded, costing the coalition support.
4. What does ‘Malay first’ mean?
Some 56% of the country’s 31 million people are ethnic Malay (defined in the constitution as Muslim), and another 13% belong to other indigenous groups, according to 2019 estimates from the Department of Statistics Malaysia. Collectively they are known as bumiputera, or “sons of the soil.” There are also large ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities who are Christian, Buddhist and Hindu. Government policies give preferential treatment to bumiputera, traditionally seen as disenfranchised, in such areas as public-sector jobs, housing and higher education. Critics say the preferences have fostered cronyism and a dependence on state handouts and have prompted many educated minorities to look for work overseas, draining the economy of talent. But they are something of a “third rail” in Malaysia’s polarized politics. Mahathir’s appointment of Lim Guan Eng as finance minister, the first ethnic Chinese to hold the post in over four decades, sowed suspicion among Malay nationalists that their benefits would be eroded, costing the coalition support.
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