Why Malaysian Voters And Civil Society Are Turning On Anwar Ibrahim – Analysis

By Han Jun Lim

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim came to power in late 2022 after years of political struggle. While his electoral victory was heralded as a major win by reformists,there is growing disillusionment with his government’sreformasiagenda.

The rapidly changing landscape of Malaysian politics has placed Anwar at odds with his former allies in the Bersih civil society coalition, which in June 2024gave the government what itcalled an ‘F’ gradefor slow reforms. Observers havealso notedthe government’s slow reforms oneconomic issuesandcorruption, including thereduced prison sentencefor disgracedformerprime ministerNajib Razakand thedropping of corruption chargesagainst deputy prime minister Zahid Hamidi.

Bersih leads a growing number of civil society organisations (CSOs)which arecritical of the Anwar administration. Their recent actions offer insight into the current state of thereformasimovement.While polling data from 2024 is unavailable, polls from 2023 showed adecline inapprovalofAnwar, whichdropped to 50 per centin October 2023 from 68 per cent in December 2022 when he was elected. The same study showed a further 60 per cent of voters in October 2023 said Malaysia was going in the wrong direction.

But Bersih has failed to mobilise largeanti-government protestson the scale it had before. One possible explanation for this disillusionment is the lack ofalternatives. Malaysians have experienced governments led by each of the major party coalitions in Malaysian politics since the fall of the Barisan Nasional government in 2018.

None were willing to embrace change and insteadleft power entrenched in the executive branch. Anwar’s election followed by his government’sslow implementation of reformhas convinced many that there is no alternative reformist. Decisions such as the reduction of Najib’s sentence and the dropping of Zahid’s charges alongside slow economic and electoral reform have dinted Anwar’s statusaswell asthereformasiagenda.

Another explanation might be perceived weakness of grassroots political movements and civil society. Though Bersih and other CSOs helped end the60-year rule of Barisan Nasional, they currently find themselves lacking the support that political parties like Anwar’s Parti Keadilan Rakyat once provided during critical protests.

While those protests didsuccessfully affectchange, opposition political parties mobilisedthe public across historically divisiveracial and religious lines. Much smaller showings since the 2018 election and recentdismissive remarksfrom politicians about Bersih,challenge the notion that grassroots organisations can bring about significant change alone. Combined with the politicking and scheming of the political class,culminating in events such as theSheraton Movethat ended the Pakatan Harapan government of Mahathir Mohamad in 2020, Malaysian voters mayperceivethepolitical system as broken.

The elephant in the room inhibiting reform is the currentmarriage of conveniencebetween two historically opposed coalitions, Pakatan Harapan and Barisan Nasional. At thecost of concessionsto his coalition partner, Anwar has brought himself much-needed stability in Malaysia’s tumultuous political scene, but also hamstrung his ability to pursue reforms.

Exacerbating this problem isthe grandeur of previous promises against thescale of Malaysia’s socioeconomic systems. A complex,race-based systemof social and economic policies has made it difficult to implement significant structural reform. Forced tonavigate the Westeros-like gauntlet thatis Malaysian politics, Anwar’sreformasiagenda is stuck between a rock and a hard place.

This tricky balance of power has led to the opposition coalition Perikatan Nasional focusing their efforts ondestabilising and overthrowingAnwar instead of offering checks and balances on reform. This has effectively left CSOs as the main opposition, representing public disgruntlement towards slow reforms, but restrained by a lack of public support in large part caused by fears of government instability or collapse.

Though declining public trust may not pose any significant short-term problems for the Anwar government thanks to his consolidation of power among elites, itmight eventually prove challenging. A poor track record of reforms is unlikely to helpAnwar in the 2027 elections, especially consideringMalaysia’s race-based politics. Pushing through small reforms aimed at restoring trust in Anwar’sreformasivision could stay the course.

With just over three years before the next general election, there is ample time for Anwar to restore trust and optimism in hisreformasiagenda.A glimpse of what this may look like is the February 2024subsidy reformsthat seek to reallocate funds to those most in needdespite the risk of political backlash from rising prices.

While Anwar may have consolidated power amongst the political class, he now faces a new challenge from civil society. CSOs in Malaysia have become a new factor in judging the efficacy of thereformasiand suggest attitudes of the electorate towards reform. The efforts of CSOs at rallying the Malaysian electorate to demand greater change now represent a new struggle between the electorate and the state as Malaysia stands at the brink of reform.

• About the author: Han Jun Lim is a student researcher at the South Asian Research and Advocacy Hub (SARAH) at The Australian National University.
• Source: This article was published by East Asia Forum