How DAP lost principles, votes and friends by choosing Dr M

The bigger picture is power and the moral claim by Pakatan Harapan Plus to get back to power is that the people have voted for a Harapan government and therefore, they must get it back from Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, by all means.

We understand this. The only question is, at what cost?

By choosing the same arrangement as before – Dr Mahathir Mohamad as PM – DAP is willing to pay the price of principles, votes, and friendship for power.

Discarding principles: Working with the man who almost destroyed Harapan

DAP appealed to its supporters to back Mahathir before the 14th general election (GE14). This was difficult as Mahathir has constantly vilified and scapegoated DAP supporters for the ills of his past administrations. But there was a larger enemy of then PM Najib Abdul Razak and his government that DAP supporters were willing to vote out to "save Malaysia".

The reason why the same could not be done now – the moral claim weakened – is because Mahathir was seen as being instrumental in bringing down Harapan.

Although claiming no "direct" involvement in the Sheraton Move, Mahathir’s actions in delaying (or refusing) to pass the baton to Anwar Ibrahim since 2019, as well as his desire to create a Malay-centric coalition, has paved the way for the destruction of Harapan.

The twin objectives that Mahathir had always wanted to achieve were to marginalise Anwar and to remove DAP elements from his government. His legacy of being a Malay defender cannot be cemented if he was not the leader of the largest Malay coalition and Anwar becomes prime minister.

After losing the prime ministership to Muhyiddin, Mahathir revealed, rather soberingly, that the country cannot accept Anwar as prime minister because he was "too liberal".

Mahathir feared that once Anwar becomes prime minister, he will share political power with the non-Malays for his closeness to DAP and that the Malays will fear their positions will be threatened.

This narrative was consistent with Mahathir’s actions to drive a wedge in PKR by using Azmin Ali to weaken Anwar politically. Mahathir elevated Azmin to the post of economic affairs minister (seen as more powerful than finance minister) and to the board of Khazanah Nasional Bhd. These moves enabled Azmin to expand his support within PKR to prevent Anwar from being prime minister.

Further, Mahathir’s recruitment of former Umno politicians into Bersatu, as well as his openness to working with Umno and PAS, allowed hardliners within his party to work towards a Malay-centric coalition in the background.

Although it may be acceptable to say that Mahathir had no "direct" involvement in the Sheraton Move, he certainly had prepared the early steps that led to Harapan’s downfall. All the pieces moved with his knowledge, and he was not a helpless victim of others’ doing.

The only thing that Mahathir would have done differently from Muhyiddin was not to include tainted leaders such as Najib and Ahmad Zahid Hamidi and to make sure that he was the PM instead. The other pieces would have been the same.

Displaying insincerity in passing the prime ministership to Anwar – a core element in accepting Mahathir into Harapan back in 2017 – and obvious attempts to wreck the Harapan coalition, Harapan supporters had enough.

By choosing to not only work with Mahathir but by placing him once again at the highest helm of power, DAP has chosen to discard the principles of the struggle, the core tenet of Harapan’s reason for being.

One of DAP’s biggest burdens throughout 22 months of governing was to show that they are different from MCA. They had to show that they were not submissive to the prime minister, and they were not willing to compromise on matters of principles.

By making a clear decision to choose the man who nearly wrecked the coalition as its highest leader once again, it is no surprise that their moral claim to power has severely dampened. But it is not just the hyper-pragmatism that bothers the DAP supporters, it is also something deeply ideological.

Discarding votes: Ideological break from being defenders of the non-Malays

Choosing Mahathir once again has signified a clear ideological break for DAP as their claim as the conscience of a multiracial and progressive Malaysia would now be affected.

Despite successfully persuading its non-Malay voters to trust Mahathir during GE14, DAP’s supporters were left disappointed. While more extremist DAP supporters were expecting the near-impossible of equal rights, most simply expected some progress in an egalitarian society. At the very least, there should not be a return to the Umno days where the non-Malays were publicly marginalised and threatened.

However, the event of Malay Dignity Congress left a bitter taste in the mouths of non-Malays. Organised by Zainal Kling, the event emphasised how Malay rights were under threat and that the citizenship of non-Malays may be suspended should they not follow the "social contract".

The thing that bothered DAP supporters was not the event itself, but who attended the event. Its attendees included top leaders from Bersatu and Mahathir delivered the keynote address - a clear indication of his ideological preference.

This is when our memory revisits us. Mahathir was after all a champion of the ideology of Malay supremacy. Just his book, "The Malay Dilemma",  has never sat well with many non-Malay DAP supporters. The promise of keeping Mahathir’s ideology at bay with Harapan’s improved accountability mechanism pre-GE14 did not work.

DAP was not able to do what MCA has failed to do. The past 22 months were also remembered as one of the most racially and religiously polarising times in recent history. Choosing Mahathir is a tactical choice with an ideological current. This does not sit well with voters who see a multiracial option in Anwar.

Discarding friendship: In and out of jail for 20 years for two years of power

You do not expect true friendship in politics. When interests change, you should expect those who once stood by you to leave you. There was, however, something different in the leaders of DAP, PKR and Amanah.

The unusual thing about the leaders of the three parties is that all of them suffered during the decades they were in the opposition. Lim Kit Siang and the late Karpal Singh paid personal sacrifices for speaking their minds; Lim Guan Eng and Mat Sabu shared prison cells when they were unfairly persecuted under Mahathir’s administration; Anwar spent 10 gruelling years in prison and 20 years vilified by the media.

Common suffering and personal sacrifices would have created a unique camaraderie that people in Bersatu did not have. Mahathir was PM for 22 years, and most of its leaders were part of the previous BN-led government as ministers or deputy ministers.

You would expect the leaders of DAP, PKR and Amanah to stick together as they had during the difficult times as the opposition. This time, however, they chose to go their separate ways. DAP’s decision to announce their support for Mahathir as PM for the second time is a demarcation of their new politics.

They are choosing one past over the other. The friendship, comradeship, and kinship are now being replaced by something thinner, more frivolous and more mundane - that of power.

And thus, we slowly extinguish the light we lit on a Harapan torch in May 2018.

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JAMES CHAI is a legal consultant and researcher working for Invoke, among others. He also blogs at jameschai.com.my. You may reach him at jameschai.mpuk@gmail.com. - Mkini