Malaysia brings curtain down with politics making loudest annoying noise on national stage

 

AS 2025 drew to a close, Malaysia will have to pause for just a little while to take stock of its national life in the past 12 months.

Indeed, it has been a tumultuous year in the sense that there had not been one moment when the country was not rocked by one controversy after another.

For starters, there is no need to cite statistics, graphs and voluminous economic reports about the health of the country.

Let’s just say that our economy is resilient, growth robust, unemployment low and investor confidence high. There is still food on the table. No one goes hungry. Poverty is kept at bay. This is quite an achievement.

However, controversies abound and they have very little to do with the health of the economy.

The events that stood out in 2025 were not about gearing the country to meet the challenges of a hi-tech era or overhauling the education system or reinforcing national unity – discussing all these issues was furthest from the minds of most politicians.

Turun Anwar rally

So, what did the politicians talk about? Did they all come up with constructive ideas and concrete proposals to lift Malaysia into developed nation status?

Did all these elected representatives at state or parliamentary level speak for all races on issues that matter most to the well-being of a country with diverse religions and cultures?

Hardly! What we have been hearing were mostly political noise that at times threatened to upset the apple cart and unravel all the decades of peaceful coexistence.

Let’s take just a few notable events that have captured public attention.

The Turun Anwar rally was one event that came close to threatening the stewardship of the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government.

Had the fairly huge street demonstration – largely masterminded by PAS – succeeded in pushing out Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim from his prime ministerial seat, the country would have been plunged into a dire situation as opposition politicians would have made a forceful bid for power.

The Islamist party has been creating so much din on the national stage ever since it made a big splash in the 15th General Election (GE15). And its ambition knows no bounds as it sets its sight on GE16 in a determined push for federal power.

That’s PAS – very active in the peninsula but rejected in Sabah. Except for one lone wolf who won a state seat, the party was soundly trashed in the November state election. It was an overwhelming verdict against its peninsular style of leadership.

Fiery defender of race, religion

The year also saw one unstoppable rising star whose headline-grabbing histrionics and antics had turned him into a hero of sorts in the eyes of his awe-struck fans. He goes by the name of Datuk Dr Muhamad Akmal Saleh.

This UMNO Youth chief had spewed a lot of smoke in the battle of the Jalur Gemilang when he fought courageously against his enemies who allegedly showed disrespect to the national flag by flying it upside down.

His most famous outing was the battle of Kepala Betas in mainland Penang where he laid siege to a cowering hardware shop owner who had unintentionally flown the flag in the wrong direction.

The Merlimau state assemblyman wanted to teach the elderly owner whom he disdainfully called “apek” a quick lesson on patriotism.

The “no fear, no surrender” general led the charge of the light brigade of UMNO Youth members but he couldn’t break through the wall of resistance formed around the shop by concerned fellow citizens who came to protect the 59-year-old owner.

Nevertheless, this Russian-trained doctor and a Malacca state executive councillor had earned his stripes not only through his valiant campaign in Kepala Batas but also in 2024’s “sock-gate” incident and the mass “boycott” movement against popular establishments like Starbucks, KFC and Burger King over the Gaza-Israeli conflict.

The ART of lost deal

Then there was the earlier furore over the relocation of a Hindu temple in Kuala Lumpur which was twisted into a controversy that pitted Hindus against Muslims and could have flared up into a serious confrontation given the sensitive nature of the dispute.

The event that drew arguably the most flak was the Agreement Reciprocal Trade (ART) deal under which the US decided to reduce the tariffs on Malaysia from 25% to 19%.

This is meant to be a strictly business transaction between two sovereign nations – it has nothing to do with selling the country’s birthright to a foreign power.

But opponents of ART promptly cast a different parochial interpretation. To them, the trade deal is tantamount to selling our sovereignty to the “Great Satan” in the person of US President Donald Trump who visited Malaysia briefly to grace the 2025 ASEAN summit.

The whole episode was twisted out of context to make it look like an overt American attempt to control the political and economic destiny of our nation.

And when the perennial mischief-maker Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad cast the trade deal as posing a grave threat to Malay privileges and the position of the Malay rulers, it touched a raw nerve in the dominant ethnic group.

The whole issue had reached a dangerous level that could have convulsed the country if emotions had run out of control.

“Urban Robbery Act”

Every development on the local front invariably carries heavily racial overtones as exemplified in the furore over the proposed Urban Renewal Act (URA).

The URA became a very hot political issue because it is seen as the handiwork of the DAP whom critics labelled as the “Developers’ Action Party”. The proposed law comes under the purview of the Housing and Local Government Ministry whose minister Nga Kor Ming, a National DAP deputy chairman, took the brunt of the criticism.

Essentially, URA aims to re-develop ageing flats and dilapidated neighbourhoods without the full consent of the owners. In simple terms, it means giving the residents a better quality of life.

But fault-finders immediately termed it an “Urban Robbery Act” as they are ardently convinced its real objective is to push the predominantly poor Malays out of urban areas.

Bossku to remain behind bars

Perhaps, the most significant news of the day was the reshuffling of the cabinet and even here, too, the minor juggling of posts came under instant fire from some critics who just cannot accept that non-Malays have been appointed to portfolios that – by right – should have gone to Malay ministers.

To cap it all, there was the trial of the year when former premier Datuk Seri Najib Razak was sentenced to 15 years in jail for abuse of power and money laundering in the 1MDB scandal case.

The Kuala Lumpur High Court found him guilty of all 25 charges and that verdict brought to a closure to this long-running saga.

Although the disgraced 10-time Pekan MP is appealing against the ruling, Malaysia can breathe a sigh of relief that the RM2.5 bil state funds scandal is no longer an albatross hanging round its neck.

But still the stain will remain forever etched in the annals of Malaysian history.

There are many other issues that have cropped up during the 12 months of 2025 which were mostly driven by political imperative. Politicising every issue – minor or major – has become the norm of the day.

Most of the time, it is politics that holds sway over the life of the nation and this disruptive trend will continue unabated.

Malaysia will carry the same heavy baggage loaded with the political detritus of 2025 into the new year following which the public can expect more trouble and fireworks from the likes of Akmal, PAS and other like-minded champions of race and religion.

Like it or not, Malaysia is stuck in the mud of politics with mud-slinging tirade continuing to take centre-stage in the everyday life of the nation. 

Phlip Rodrigues is a retired journalist.

The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of  MMKtT.

- Focus Malaysia.