GE-13: The Battle of the Coalitions

Malaysia’s 13th general election, which must be held by April 2013, has been the most anticipated in Malaysian history, given the megatrends that are occurring in the country and the ability of the two main coalition contenders to manage them.

Barisan Nasional (BN/National Front) and the Pakatan Rakyat (PR/People’s Alliance/Pact) are the main contestants. The BN—currently the longest-ruling coalition in the world—is a 13-party coalition based mainly around ethnic and regional interests. The United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) is the single most important political party in the ruling coalition, dominating not only the coalition, but all major institutions in Malaysia, except in the state of Sarawak. Najib Razak, son of Malaysia’s second prime minister, has led the coalition through an interparty compromise since becoming UMNO president.

The PR, in turn, is a new and informal coalition, set up in the euphoria of the opposition’s historical performance at the March 2008 12th general election. None of its three component parties has a clear majority, and all understand that their success is predicated on their ability to work together. Keadilan’s (The People’s Justice Party) unelected leader Anwar Ibrahim leads the coalition by virtue of his ability to hold together three disparate groups—the Chinese-dominated Democratic Action Party (DAP), the Islamic Party of Malaysia (PAS) and his own band of largely ex-BN/UMNO members.

5 megatrends

Five critical megatrends face the contenders at the national level: economic performance, demographic changes, urbanisation, Islamisation and an island/peninsular divide.

The middle-income trap: The popular diagnosis for Malaysia’s stagnating economic performance is that Malaysia is caught in a middle-income trap, where it is unable to compete with low-cost producers on cost, but also by not having the institutions, human resources and technological capabilities to compete with advanced economies in innovative products and processes.

A young nation: 71% of Malaysians are under the age of 40, with 34% aged between 20 and 40.

An urban nation: 71% of Malaysia is now urban, Only Kelantan, Pahang, Perlis, Sabah and Sarawak, where urbanisation rates are below 55%, are still largely rural.

An Islamic nation: The pervasiveness of Islam as a political tool and the increasing piety among Muslims have reached unprecedented levels.

Two nations: The politics of peninsular Malaysia starkly differ from that of the island of Borneo. Political leaders and citizens in Sabah and Sarawak continue to distrust peninsular politicians, and all politics in these two states is local.

Electoral issues

These trends translate into electoral issues in the following ways. Most critically for the BN, its successful economic strategy is now being questioned on several counts. First, Malaysia’s low-cost, export-oriented economic model has seen wages for 80% of Malaysian households stagnate for the past three decades. These households earn less than RM3000 a month, in a country where the average monthly income is RM4025

More critically, the bottom 40% of Malaysian households earn RM1 440 a month. Seventy-one per cent of this bottom 40% are bumiputeras—a Malay term translated literally as ‘prince of land’. The average monthly income of the top 20% of households is RM10 000.

International benchmarks and surveys consistently show that the quality of education in Malaysia, at all levels, cannot match that of the successful East Asian economies. Eighty per cent of Malaysia’s labour force has no more than the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) qualification (equivalent to Year 10), and the 57 universities and the more than 500 colleges are producing large numbers of poorly equipped graduates. This has led to a poorly skilled labour force and unemployed graduates, with the economy facing severe skills shortages in a tight labour market.

This has had a significant impact on Malaysia’s young voters. The majority of local graduates utilise a government loan scheme. With limited employability and mediocre wages, they end up saddled with enormous debts. The problem is exacerbated by high unemployment. Graduates accounted for more than one-quarter of those unemployed in 2007, while unemployment among new graduates was 24.1% in 2008.

The public sector, at the federal and state level, and government-linked corporations (GLCs) have long been used to mop up bumiputera graduates as part of an implicit contract between UMNO and the Malays. With the country experiencing economic stagnation, rising public debt, depleting natural resource rents from fossil fuels, the bloated civil service and GLCs are now a severe drag on the Malaysian economy and can no longer function as a source of employment opportunity for the thousands of Bumiputera graduates.

Many non-bumiputera graduates also suffer the same predicament, as they are locked out of the public sector and the GLCs. Many are also ill-equipped to meet the demands of the private sector, especially in businesses exposed to international competition.

Urbanization

Increasing urbanisation has led to greater interaction between Malaysians of different races and also between Malaysians and the outside world. Although there is still significant segmentation among the races and social classes in urban areas, this has meant greater interaction at work and global development that have produced varied results. Most importantly, the interactions have forced Malaysians to focus more on the issues that affect their daily lives such as the quality of life, the cost of living, or global events such as the Arab Spring.

Urbanisation also challenges the BN’s monopoly on information, In 2010, 65% of Malaysians were using the internet. Cyberspace has been a boon for the opposition and civil society, and is an arena the BN has yet to effectively control. High urbanisation rates, which are driven primarily through rural–urban migration, also connect rural areas and urban centres more strongly through social networks. Families and individuals returning to their rural homes for festivities bring with them the latest political developments, made more accessible by the internet. This is further challenging the BN’s control in rural areas.

Islamization

While Islam had always mattered in the political and social sphere as an ideology, it is now also encroaching into the economic sphere.

Islamisation of the public sphere—despite Malaysia’s secular constitution—has taken a concrete foothold in Malaysian society, due mainly to the contest between UMNO and PAS for the Malay votes. Global developments have also influenced this trend. Islamic fundamentalism now pervades all aspects of Malaysian life, both public and private. While Islam had always mattered in the political and social sphere as an ideology, it is now also encroaching into the economic sphere.

Politics on the island of Borneo is based on local issues and mistrust of the federal government. The 2008 general election established the importance of Sabah and Sarawak in forming federal government. Sabah and Sarawak have become increasingly assertive since. As all politics on the island are local, and as a result of their strengthened bargaining position, Sabah and Sarawak—long considered fixed deposits for the Basian Nasional—are no longer a foregone conclusion.

Battle of the coalitions

The response from the contenders is influenced primarily by their incumbency—or lack of it. The component parties of the BN—until the 2008 general election—had long-serving leaders, which impacted severely on inter and intraparty dynamism. The incumbency of these leaders and the BN resulted in a disconnect between entrenched party leaders and grassroots leaders, as well as members and supporters. Interparty competition for resource rents and for patronage has also resulted in leaders leaving the party or being put away in ‘cold storage’.

The incumbency of these leaders has also limited the ability of the parties to attract new members and develop new and dynamic second-echelon leaders. Most damaging has been the UMNO’s increased strength: this has relegated other coalition partners to minions, effectively making elite bargaining redundant—the hallmark of the BN.

In contrast, the Pakatan Ryat, despite strong leadership, has only marginally more democratic processes, due mainly to limited opportunities to access and distribute resource rents. The Reformasi, Bersih and HINDRAF movements, Anwar Ibrahim’s charisma, and most importantly, the government’s inability to manage the megatrends, have seen young people flocking to the PR.

Their arguments

The two main contenders have framed their arguments for support in a contrasting manner. UMNO, through the BN, has argued that social stability delivers economic growth and that only a strong UMNO can guarantee social stability.

At the 13th general election, UMNO will be arguing that it has the track record in delivering social stability and economic growth. PR, instead, is arguing that good governance and social justice are critical to Malaysia’s continued economic growth and social stability. PR argues that the persistent weakening of the Malaysian economy, and social unrest, are due to the BN’s mismanagement of the economy, its divisive racial and religious politics, and the abuse of the rule of law.

The 2008 general election solidified the two-coalition system, and this is unlikely to be reversed. The surprising aspect of this development is that it took opposition parties 50-odd years to cooperate effectively, considering that Malaysians never gave the BN, on average, more than 57% of the popular votes—with its best-ever result of 65% achieved only in the booming 90s, at the 1995 general election.

Malaysians have demonstrated time and again that, despite its hegemony, the BN is not an overwhelmingly popular coalition. While the results of the 13th general election will depend mainly on the leadership abilities of Najib Razak and Anwar Ibrahim to manage their coalitions in addressing issues, neither coalition will remain in power for long—even with the support of a rigged electoral system—if it fails to address these megatrends effectively.

Greg Lopez is the editor of the Malaysia section of New Mandala, an academic blog hosted by the College of Asia Pacific, the Australian National University. He is a PhD candidate at the ANU’s Crawford School of Public Policy.

- http://www.asaa.asn.au/publications/ac/2012/asian-currents-12-06.pdf