Malaysia political crisis

[jaichind]

If I had to guess what is going on is

a) Anwar is trying to rattle the GPS (UMNO-PPBM-PBS) alliance in the upcoming Sabah assembly election and push marginal Sabah voters that are focused on federal subsidies to vote for  WARISAN-PH over the GPS alliance in the weekend election

b) It seems some UMNO MPs are playing along perhaps to grab a share of power but with tacit support from UMNO high command who want to use this to extra greater pound of flesh in power sharing at the federal level from Muhyiddin/PPBM.  The way UMNO figure it even if this blows up in their face what will most likely happen is a snap election where UMNO clearly will gain seats.

[jaichind]

Now would be a useful time list out the Malay MP list

BN
  UMNO       39 (38 elected in 2018, 1 by by-election) (Malay party)
  MCA           2 (1 elected in 2018, 1 by by-election) (Chinese party)
  MIC            1 (1 elected in 2018) (Indian party)
  PBRS          1 (1 elected in 2018) (Sabah Christian tribal)

PAS            18 (18 elected in 2018) (Malay Islamic party)

GPS (Sarawak ruling bloc)
 PBB          13 (13 elected in 2018) (Sarawak Muslim tribal)
 PRS           2 (2 elected in 2018) (Sarawak Christian tribal)
 SPDP         2 (2 elected in 2018) (Sarawak Christian tribal)
 SUPP         1 (1 elected in 2018) (Sarawak Chinese)
 GPS Ind     1 (PRS rebel elected in 2018 then joined PKR then defected to GPS)

PN
  PPBM       31 (6 elected in 2018, 10 PKR defectors (Azmin Ali faction), 15 UMNO defectors)
  PBS           1 (1 elected in 2018) (Sabah Christian tribal)
  STAR         1 (1 elected in 2018) (Sabah Christian tribal)

PH
  DAP         42 (42 elected in 2018) (Chinese)
  PKR         38 (36 elected in 2018, 2 independents that joined after 2018) (Multi-ethnic)
  AMANAH  11 (11 elected in 2018) (PAS moderate splinter)

WARISAN bloc (Sabah ruling bloc)
  WARISAN  9 (8 elected in 2018, 1 UMNO defector) (Sabah Malay)
  UPKO        1 (1 elected in 2018 as BN alliance then defected to WARISAN) (Sabah Christian tribal)

PSB            2  (2 defectors from PRS) (Sarawak Christian tribal) (pro-PH)

PEJUANG     5 (5 elected as PPBM, Mahathir faction) (pro-PH)

MUDA         1 (1 elected as PPBM, youth splinter from Mahathir faction) (pro-PH)

Right now the ruling bloc has BN PN and PAS which adds up to 113 vs 109 for the opposition.

For Anwar's claim to be true (2/3 majority) it will have to be the 91 from PH, 1 from MUDA, 10 from WARISAN bloc and 2 from PSB plus most if not all of UMNO.  Mahathir is against Anwar becoming PM so PEJUANG's 5 is out.

Anwar led PH-UMNO alliance will be truly farcical.  I suspect it will work on practice as DAP will most likely leave such an alliance to join up with  Mahathir.  Perhaps Anwar convinced most UMNO MPs to leave UMNO and join PKR ?  

[jaichind]

Past history of Anwar claiming a majority for him being PM which never showed up

Anwar: Pakatan Rakyat can take over Fed Govt by Sept 16 - 23 Apr 2008
https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2008...govt-by-sept-16

Anwar says he has majority to rule - SEPTEMBER 16, 2008
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-malaysia...0080916?sp=true

Anwar says Pakatan Harapan has the numbers to form Malaysia's government - FEB 29, 2020
https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/a...sias-government

Will this be the 4th ?

[jaichind]

It seems part of the defectors that Anwar is talking about seems to be GPS or the Sarawak ruling bloc.  If so most likely this is a GPS scare tactic to extract concessions from PPBM PM Muhyiddin.  GPS's main electoral competition in Sarawak is PKR-DAP.  It makes no sense for GPS bloc to form an alliance with PH.

[jaichind]

My guess what is going on

Muhyiddin's plan: Wants snap elections and is the only one to be able to call one but does not want one unless there is a rock solid UMNO-PAS-PPBM seat sharing agreement.   So his plan is PN does well in Sabah assembly elections this weekend which increases his hand to force UMNO-PAS to have a seat sharing alliance with Muhyiddin as the PM candidate and then call a snap election.

UMNO plan: Wants a snap election which UMNO-PAS will win but does not want Muhyiddin and PPBM in the alliance where they have to share power.  Problem is  only Muhyiddin can call an election. So if UMNO allows some of his MPs to "defect" to Anwar it will destroy Muhyiddin's majority and a PPBM out of power will completely collapse.  So for Muhyiddin to save himself he has to call elections even if there is no seat sharing agreement between UMNO-PAS and PPBM.

UMNO "15 defector plan": Try to get the most out current situation.  If defecting to Anwar means more power for them personally.  Great. Since their "defect" is tactically sanctioned by UMNO high command they even if Muhyiddin just then call a snap election they can still run on UMNO ticket and come back as a part of a UMNO-PAS majoruty.  Win-win situation 

Anwar plan:  Anwar is sort of the Hillary Clinton of Malaysian politics.  There were many situations where Anwar could have become PM but somehow lady luck always pass him by.  Getting these UMNO defector is his last chance to become PM so he is charging forward even though he knows it could be a UMNO trap.  The way he must be justifying it to his allies must be: this gambit could help the  WARISAN-PH alliance in the Sabah assembly election this weekend so please play along since coming back to power or stopping a Muhyiddin snap election that UMNO-PAS will sweep involves a Sabah assembly election victory.

It seems UMNO played this very well if what I think is going on is true.  What UMNO will achieve is to play Muhyiddin  and Anwar against each other to force a midterm election where it will be UMNO-PAS vs PPBM vs PH where most likely it will be a UMNO-PAS landslide especially when Anwar has shown himself to be a political opportunist by doing deals with the "corrupt" UMNO. 

[jaichind]

Mahathir  said he will not run in the next general election which means the death of PEJUANG  after the next election.

[jaichind]

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/9/25/malaysia-power-struggle-set-to-drag-on-as-king

Anwar will not disclose the names of the "defectors" that came to his side until he meets with the King.  But the King is now in the hospital for a week and cannot see anyway.   For Anwar most likely this is a feature and not a bug and has the side effect of provoking conflict between PPBM and UMNO  with an eye on the Sabah assembly elections tomorrow.

[jaichind]

Now that the Sabah mid-term assembly election has resulted in a narrow victory for GPS with PPBM doing reasonably well, on paper mean Muhyiddin will move forward with a mid-term federal election soon. 

Of course there is the issue of Anwar and his claim of a large number of defectors (mostly UMNO and Sarawak MPs.)  The election results most likely means that if any of these "defectors" were real, most if not all of them have pulled back their support for Anwar.  Any of these possible "defectors" are almost now certainly doing so to increase their leverage with respect  to Muhyiddin and seat sharing talks.

And seat sharing talks will be a clear glaring problem for the BN-PN-PAS landslide to come once the election is called.  In  Kelantan, Kedah, and Terengganu, PAS will demand UMNO accommodate them in the seats PAS won in 2018 if not more, something the local UMNO will not accept.  Likewise PPBM will demand UMNO accommodate PPBM in seats PPBM currently hold.  But most of those seats are really UMNO defectors, especially in Sabah.  It is hard to see UMNO will accept ceding these seat which UMNO consider its core.   Now that GPS won Sabah, I can see both UMNO and PPBM read the election as "their victory" and ramp up their demands in seat sharing talks.  I can even see a situation where seat sharing talks fall apart and it ends up being BN vs PPBM-PAS in the general elections.  If that were to come to pass then the GPS government in Sabah might fall apart and  WARISAN-PH come back to  power if certain parts of GPS were to defect due to the collapse of the BN-PN alliance.

One way or another there is more fun to come and soon.

[jaichind]

https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/government-economy/malaysia-ruling-partys-pick-for-sabah-minister-could-fray-ties

In Sabah, GPS goes with PPBM  leader Hajiji Noor to be the new CM.   PPBM PM Muhyiddin seems to be calling UMNO's bluff by pushing in his candidate to be CM over the objections of UMNO.  I guess what PPBM PM Muhyiddin is saying to UMNO is "we won in Sabah because of me, I should get to call the shots there since the victory is my"

In the meantime Anwar is still waiting to meet with the hospitalized King to show him the list of supporters and convince the King to appointment him PM.  Plenty of time for maneuvers by all sides. 

[jaichind]

https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/09/29/claiming-umno-bullied-by-bersatu-in-sabah-lokman-demands-bn-chair-pull-reps/1907885

Signs of rebellion within UMNO on how its was out-maneuvered by PPBM in Sabah in the race for CM.  There are not demands for UMNO to leave the ruling alliance.  I guess this is the basis of Anwar's gambit.  I doubt it will pan out but still UMNO high command is now in a tough position.  All this can be solved by a mid-term election but UMNO does not seem to be able to move the chess pieces to that election where UMNO will most likely make large gains.

[jaichind]

Anwar is set to meet the King next 10/16 Tuesday.  Hopefully after that we can get the to bottom of the claim that a bunch of UMNO MP are backing Anwar.

[jaichind]

Anwar is set to meet the King next 10/16 Tuesday.  Hopefully after that we can get the to bottom of the claim that a bunch of UMNO MP are backing Anwar.

Source (also, just to be clear, his meeting is set for Tuesday the 13th).

There are unconfirmed rumors from within PKR that his support among UMNO MPs has increased, which is… suspect, to put it mildly.

Yes, typo by me ... I meant Tuesday the 13th.  In theory it is possible that the number UMNO defectors might have increased over frustrations over the share of spoils in Sabah but for every UMNO MP Anwar gains he might lose twice as much in DAP support.  Whole think is fishy.  Still I eagerly look forward to Tuesday to see what emerges.

[jaichind]

https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2020/10/11/tension-brewing-in-umno-as-several-mps-refuse-to-toe-the-line/

"Tension brewing in Umno as several MPs refuse to toe the line"

Wait, so this whole some UMNO MPs backing Anwar is not a hoax ?  I guess we will find out Tuesday.  I think even if this is not a hoax is is some 3-D Chess UMNO is playing to get Muhyiddin to call early elections.  But I guess with renewed COVID-19 outbreak due to Sabah election even that will be out for now.

[jaichind]

As expected, Anwar's gambit ended up being a dud.  Even though Anwar claimed he submitted a list of 120 MPs that supported him to be PM the palace released a statement that Anwar did not submit a list.

I think it is about time Anwar is let out onto the pasture.  He reminds me a lot of Hillary Clinton where there were several times she, like Anwar, could have held the top office but it is just not in the stars.

[jaichind]

https://coconuts.co/kl/news/after-anwar-ibrahim-major-political-party-umno-is-the-next-threat-to-malaysian-government/

UMNO puts pressure on PPBM to change the resource allocation of their alliance or else they might leave PN government.   I guess they figure now is a good time to increase their share of the spoils.

[jaichind]

It seems pretty clear that Muhyiddin did manage to get a deal with UMNO but has a fear that some malcontents within UMNO will sink his government over the budget vote ergo his maneuver with this state of emergency.  Now Muhyiddin is in a much weaker position.  UMNO will most likely up their ante on PPBM to get more of the spoils in return for 100% UMNO vote for Muhyiddin in the budget vote in Nov.  Plenty of more maneuvers to come, mostly on the Muhyiddin vs UMNO front.  If it comes to an early election where UMNO-PAS will sweep the elections I wonder if PH might come in to back Muhyiddin just to stop a mid-term election they will certainly lose.

I think PH are in the same position as LAB and LDEM were in the UK Fall of 2019 where a fresh election will doom PH.  Hopefully for PH sake it plays it better than Corbyn did back in Fall of 2019.

[jaichind]

It seems as UMNO was about to come out openly against Muhyiddin, he made the last minute desperate move of elevating as UMNO leader to DPM.  It did not work.  Still there are still pro-Muhyiddin  elements in UMNO so there are still chances that some UMNO MPs will stick around to back Muhyiddin although if it comes to a showdown Muhyiddin will be defeated if and when it comes to a vote.  Main problem for anti-Muhyiddin forces is that that the anti-Muhyiddin  forces will not be able to agree on an alternative so Muhyiddin will stay in power as interim PM while an election takes place.  COVID-19 means that this election will be far off keeping Muhyiddin  in power.

As for the election the party to watch is PAS.  If PAS backs PPBM it will be a close 3 way battle between PPBM-PAS vs UMNO vs PH.  If PAS backs UMNO then UMNO-PAS will win in a landslide.

[jaichind]

Why would PAS back PPBM? Would the decision be out of sheer likelihood to get into the next government or due to some sort of fallout with UMNO?

Mostly because of political geography.   States where PAS is strong, Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu, are also places where UMNO are strong and PPBM in their current form are non-existent.  So seat sharing talks will be very hard for UMNO and PAS but easy for PPBM and PAS.  In case of a PPBM-PAS alliance, PAS will run in Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu while in the rest of Peninsular Malaysia PPBM and PAS will most likely share seats by something like 3 to 1 ratio in favor of PPBM.  A UMNO-PAS alliance talk will almost breakdown right away over how to divide up Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu.

And we see this playing out

https://www.theedgemarkets.com/article/pas-mic-express-support-muhyiddin

"PAS, MIC express support for Muhyiddin"

Interesting that old BN Indian party MIC  is also coming out for Muhyiddin.  It does seems UMNO, seeing that its Chinese ally MCA and Indian ally MIC did not really transfer that many votes to them in 2018, are most likely to drop them as allies or give them very few seats to run in the next election. Reading this fact MIC, it seems, will go with PPBM.  Last I check MCA might run separately which is very had news for PH as the anti-UMNO Chinese vote could now safely vote MCA to show their frustration of DAP.

[jaichind]

https://www.theonlinecitizen.com/2021/07/08/malaysia-mahathirs-pejuang-officially-registered-as-political-party/

"Malaysia: Mahathir’s Pejuang officially registered as political party"

Mahathir’s party, PEJUANG or PPTA, has been finally registered as a party a year after its formed.  Just in time to split the PH vote in the next election ?

[jaichind]

Aren't both MIC and MCA irreverent parties at this point?

Only if they are allied with UMNO.  In 2018 the Chinese and Indian vote shifted heavily to PH to vote against UMNO.  If you look at the results and compare them to state elections it is clear that UMNO vote transfers with MCA and MIC were catastrophic.  MCA and MIC have their share of support in the Chinese and Indian votes.  By 2018 their alliance UMNO was enough for their votes to shift to DAP and PKR.

I think MCA running by itself can win a good chunk of the Chinese vote.  They allying with PPBM would be a good move to regain their Chinese vote.  MIC's Indian vote I think is more suspect and I think some of their vote might have permanently moved to PKR and DAP.

Back in 2018 I did a statistical analysis that showed that PH won an unusual level of Chinese and Indian votes.   Next election there will be some reversion to the mean and MCA and perhaps MIC could pick up some of that vote which could be valuable if allied with a non-UMNO party.

I was able do a regression analysis of the results by district in Peninsular Malaysia and derive vote by ethnic group.  I used variables such as rural suburban and urban and grouped states that seems to voted similarly as well as take into account of special candidates that will over-perform their own party.

What I got is

Malays (60.9% of the voting population)
PH  24.5%
BN  44.0%
GS  31.5%

Chinese (29.0% of the voting population)
PH   94.0%
BN    5.5%
GS    0.5%

Indian (8.4% of the voting population)
PH   74.5%
BN   24.0%
GS    1.5%

Orang Asli (Aborigine) (0.6% of the voting population)
PH    2.0%
BN   97.0%
GS    1.0%

Others (1.1% of the voting population)
PH   19.5%
BN   63.5%
GS   17.0%

I also compute that when PAS is not running the PAS vote goes 83.5% for BN and 16.5% for PH.


Below is a chart of estimates of vote share by ethnic group in previous elections


It seems the PH large vote share lead was really driven by Chinese and Indian voters which all things equal did not add that much in terms of gaining seats for PH except for very close BN-PH marginal seats.  PH on the whole actually under-performed pre-election polls in terms of Malay support. What crushed BN was the fact that PAS over-performed at the expense of BN in the Malay vote.  So in the end the PH-PAS split worked to the advantage of PH and not BN which was the conventional wisdom.

If you look at the Malay vote by district type you can get some clear patterns

                   PH          BN           PAS
Rural          17.0%     48.5%     34.5%
Suburban    27.5%     43.0%     29.5%
Urban         37.0%     36.5%     26.5%

PH does better with urban Malays while BN does best with rural Malays.  What is the surprise here is how well PAS does even with urban Malays although that did not seem to make much of a difference in terms of seats.  It is PAS's over-performance in Rural and Suburban seats that cost BN seats, either to PH or PAS.

What is also interesting is in areas of PAS strength like Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu PAS does just as well in Urban areas among Malay voters as Rural Malay voters.  It is BN that has a falloff in Malay support in these states as well as in other states.

On interesting driver for this PAS strength with Urban Malays is if you take areas where the PH is gaining strength (Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, suburban and urban Johor) PAS does very well with Malay voters when an non-UNMO party is running when compared to when UNMO is running.  It seems this is mostly driven by the BN Malay anti-DAP vote which went over PAS now that PAS is not allied with DAP especially an non-UNMO candidate is running for BN.

This is why MCA and MIC got crushed.  They lost both ways.  The Chinese seats were lost in 2013 and will remain lost.  MCA and MIC won some ethnically mixed seats from 2013 based on the Malay vote and what is left of the Chinese and Indian vote.  This time around there is a further swing of the Chinese and Indian vote away from BN PLUS the Malay vote going over to PAS.  The result was a complete meltdown of MCA and MIC seats.

So again the story of this election is not a Malay Tsunami toward PH.  PH if anything did a bit worse than expected with Malays.  What took place was PAS took some of the BN anti-DAP vote and destroyed BN along the way.

We can now take these breakdown in support to try to estimate the levels of support for each party.

For the PH Chinese vote you can figure 67% are for DAP and 33% are for PKR.  
For the PH Indian vote you can figure 20% are for DAP and 80% are for PKR
For the PH Malay vote you can figure 35% are for PKR, 20% are for AMANAH and 45% are for PPBM.

For BN it is simple.  All BN Malay votes are for UNMO and all BN Indian votes are for MIC (and a bit for Gerakan) and all BN Chinese votes are for MCA/PPP/Gerakan.

Using this you can estimate the level of support for each party and you get.

DAP                             19.6%
PKR                             19.1%
AMANAH                        3.0%
PPBM                             6.9%
UNMO                          27.8%
MCA/Gerakan                 1.6%
MIC/PPP                        2.0%
PAS                             20.0%

The main danger for PH is that around 55% of voter support are from Chinese.  It is critical that for political power in PH to flow to PKR and PPBM to avoid PH being tagged as a DAP puppet.  This was the BN line of attack which did not work because Mahathir.  But if DAP's influence were to match its vote share with PH this will be a problem with PH when it comes to winning Malay votes in the future.

[jaichind]

https://www.theonlinecitizen.com/2021/07/08/malaysia-mahathirs-pejuang-officially-registered-as-political-party/

"Malaysia: Mahathir’s Pejuang officially registered as political party"

Mahathir’s party, PEJUANG or PPTA, has been finally registered as a party a year after its formed.  Just in time to split the PH vote in the next election ?

On a side note, this ends an incredibly petty series of actions from the Home Minister, who apparently waited till the very last day of the judge's mandated fourteen-day injunction to grant Pejuang's appeal over their previous action.

And I do doubt that Pejuang will split much of the vote – the seats it occupies in Parliament are much more vulnerable to UMNO/PAS/PPBM frontal assaults, and Pakatan's presence in these races would be negligible. Pakatan probably will stay out of Pejuang's backyard unless Pejuang massively steps up its organization and recruitment across the electoral map, something Mahathir's previous vehicle notably failed to do, and even then that support is likelier to be drawn from disaffected government supporters if anything.

 

You are right of course.  When I wrote that PEJUANG  might split the PH vote I partly meant that as a joke that it got registration mostly because PPBM wants them to undercut PH in the next election.  In reality I think Mahathir is smart enough to know that outside of Kedah PEJUANG  most likely will be at best spoilers.   I suspect when it comes to an election PEJUANG  and Syed Saddiq's youth MUDA party will just end up forming an alliance with PH.  Unless they do most likely they will be all washed up.

[jaichind]

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/malaysia-cabinet-unanimous-full-support-muhyiddin-yassin-umno-15218884

"Malaysia Cabinet pledges ‘full support’ for PM Muhyiddin following UMNO withdrawal"

After UMNO withdrew support from Muhyiddin, all UMNO members of the cabinet continues to support Muhyiddin  highlighting the split within UMNO.   All 3 main blocs seems to be in trouble with UMNO split, PH stuck with Anwar and lost its credibility for how its government collapsed in 2020, and PPBM now on the hook for the endless COVID-19 surges and lockdowns.  Only PAS seems to be unscathed.  I suspect turnout next election will be very low which all things equal should hand victory to UMNO even without PAS support.   

 

[jaichind]

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/anwar-and-zahid-step-up-drive-against-embattled-premier

PH leader Anwar and UMNO leader Zahid plans to make a joint video of their MPs where they will state their opposition to Muhyiddin government.  The idea is the video will be delivered to the King to prove that Muhyiddin no longer has majority support.

Muhyiddin has already agreed to a vote of confidence next month but Anwar and Zahid must be worried that this means Muhyiddin has a month to buy off enough MPs to win such a vote and now want to pressure the King to bring forward the vote.

In this case the COVID-19 surge is acting as a Muhyiddin ally.

[jaichind]

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/call-for-removal-of-pm-muhyiddin-triggers-civil-war-in-umno

"Call for removal of PM Muhyiddin triggers 'civil war' in Umno"

Looks like UMNO is split down the middle on supporting Muhyiddin.  Out of the 38 UMNO MPs, 15 MP seems to back UMNO leader Zahid position of opposing Muhyiddin while 23 UMNP MPs seems to be breaking ranks and backing Muhyiddin.  Of course 15 MPs are more than enough for Muhyiddin to lose a VONC in Sept so he has his work cut out for himself to lure some of these 15 UMNO MPs back and get other defections from the PH bloc.

I think core issue for UMNO is if there should be an alliance with PPBM and PAS in the next election.  Some UMNO MPs  think they can win without an alliance with PPBM and PAS.  Others are fearful that if PAS runs in their district they will lose and with PAS backing Muhyiddin see backing Muhyiddin as a way to keep the PAS away from their district next election.  At the strategic level UMNO is divided on if an alliance with PPBM-PAS is necessary for them to win the next election.   Another way to look at it is who is UMNO's long term enemy? Is it PH whose vote base is separate from that of UMNO but having a rival ideology or is it PPBM-PAS who might be ideologically close to UMNO but are looking to eat up UMNO's vote base. 

[jaichind]

https://www.sinarharian.com.my/article/154685/BERITA/Politik/Nik-Nazmi-dakwa-ditawar-RM30-juta-untuk-sokong-kerajaan-PN

PHK sources say that the price the ruling bloc is willing to pay for 1 MP to defect has risen from $4.5 million to around $7.5 million.  Not sure if I trust the source that it would make sense for  Muhyiddin bloc to try to recruit from PH alliance to make up the numbers.