How long will Najib last?

QUESTION TIME There’s a better than even chance that Najib will not be PM for long.

While forecasting is pretty dangerous, I humbly estimate that there’s a better than even chance that Najib Razak will not be prime minister for long - he won’t take Umno into the next polls, putting his remaining time at the top at two to three years from now.

While there is a strong impression of support for him within Umno, there is one key question that will weigh heavily - very heavily - on the collective mind of the party: With Najib leading the party, will Umno and its allies under BN be able to muster enough votes to win the next general election?

This question assumes far greater seriousness because the latest available opinion polls from the Merdeka Center indicate that there has been a large swing against the Najib administration.

According to news reports in October last year, only one of four Malaysians - or 23 percent to be exact - approve of Najib’s government. This is sharply down by about half from nearly one out of two, or 48 percent, in June 2014. Tellingly, Malay support about halved too, hitting a low of 31 percent from 60 percent in June 2014.

The report said the survey was conducted among respondents in peninsular Malaysia in August last year, shortly after Najib dismissed Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin for his critical stance on 1MDB.

This is the first time since the start of the Merdeka polls from early 2012 that Najib could not get majority support from the Malay community. If this lack of support from Malays translates into the next elections, then it is likely that the opposition will take power.

A counter-argument is that the opposition is in disarray and in no position to challenge the incumbents but one cannot discount that they will get their act together nearer to the polls and pull themselves into a stronger alliance.

For Umno, the immediate risk is whether they can afford to take that risk. While seeming support for Najib is strong there are shifting undercurrents of discontent. That “political donation” song routine does not wash with most Malaysians and likely Umno, too, although leaders keep singing it to guard and strengthen their position.

Such revelations in most countries would have seen the voluntary resignation of leaders and action taken against them, but Najib is clearly digging in with the removal of both the attorney-general and the deputy prime minister in almost simultaneous moves last August.

The new attorney-general keeps reiterating that Najib has done no wrong by accepting RM2.6 billion into his accounts although the MACC Act provides that any donation to a public official is considered a gratification unless proven otherwise. That clearly indicates that the courts are the best place to decide if Najib is guilty or innocent, but the attorney-general’s stance stops that.

Meantime reports pooh-pooh notions that the RM2.6 billion was a donation from Saudi Arabia while international investigations into 1MDB and its numerous violations will continue to add further pressure and plague Najib incessantly.

The RM2.6 billion “donation” and the many problems and dubious dealings at 1MDB which have not been properly investigated leaving those responsible scot-free, will continue to haunt Najib. It will become a key election issue which will be repeatedly played up by the opposition during campaigning.

How will Umno remove Najib?

With Umno polls postponed to after the general election, which can be called earlier but are not due until after May 2018, how does Umno remove Najib even if most of the leadership really want to? Anyone who attempts that through consensus risks suspension before he can complete the process.

The likely scenario then might be to persuade Najib that it is not in Umno’s and his own interests that Najib lead the party into the polls. If he does and Umno (and BN) loses, then everyone in Umno, and others who have left Umno like Dr Mahathir Mohamad, lose heavily, too.

To induce Najib to go voluntarily, it may be necessary to dangle some carrots such as no legal action over that RM2.6 billion or 1MDB and other such sweeteners. That would not change Umno much but it definitely makes it easier for the party and its allies to try and win the next elections.

Najib would have to give his successor at least a year to take the party into the polls, which means that under this scenario he may not be PM for much more than two years.

For aspiring leaders within Umno, with Najib’s stepping down, three layers of leadership will be removed, hastening their rise to the top - the other two being suspended deputy president Muhyiddin Yassin and embattled vice-president Shafie Apdal. The attempted removal of the latter two only goes to show that Umno leaders should not be too quick to move against Najib.

Which is why, at the end of the day, it is easier to get Najib to step down by making him see that staying on will not help even him than to try to overthrow him. The question is how, and who will do it - and when.

Mahathir announced that he was stepping down after 22 years at the helm as prime minister at an Umno general assembly in 2003, taking everyone by surprise. Persistent talk was that he was advised that public opinion was very much against him after the Anwar Ibrahim sodomy trials - it was so strong that he might lose.

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi took over, promising sweeping reforms, including an independent commission to investigate the police and firm measures against corruption. The public, swept away by his election promises which promised accountability, transparency and freedom versus Mahathir’s patronage and tyranny, gave him the biggest-ever victory for BN - 64 percent of the popular vote and 92 percent of parliamentary seats in 2004.

But when he broke all major promises, a disillusioned public, despite a weak opposition which fielded some very dubious candidates who nevertheless won, gave BN a stinging setback in 2008. Although winning, BN lost its two-thirds majority in Parliament and five states in peninsular Malaysia.

Abdullah stepped down to make way for Najib in 2009. Najib made some marginal gains in the 2013 elections, largely due to Malay support but lost the popular vote to the opposition.

If only Abdullah had done something about corruption when he won big in 2004 that RM2.6 billion “donation” would never have happened and 1MDB would have been unheard of.

Will anyone else ever have such a chance of making Malaysia over? And who will it be in 2018?

One thing for sure, it can’t be Najib.

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Former editor P GUNASEGARAM is now an independent consultant, trainer and writer. He can be reached at t.p.guna@gmail.com. -Mkini