A FORUM at Monash University in Melbourne next week will look into what lies ahead for Malaysia after the May 9 general election.

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad will come under examination as a modernising Islamic figure with the launch of a book on his Islamic credentials.

The forum will be the latest in a series of recent events on Malaysia outside of academic circles.

Among Australians, Dr Mahathir has always been seen as an enigma, if not viewed with antipathy for his stance against the West, and his frequent use of Australia as a whipping boy.

Panellists will seek to answer the question of where Dr Mahathir might take Malaysia in his comeback, from an authoritarian figure of the past to his leading the Pakatan Harapan opposition into government on a platform of democracy and the rule of law.

The forum, a free public event on November 7, is a collaboration between Monash Asia Institute and Saya Anak Bangsa Malaysia in Australia (SABM).

On the panel are academic Sven Schottmann of Griffith University in Queensland, Kuala Lumpur-based political and security analyst Arman Rashid, and SABM president Praveen Nagappan.

Schottmann will look at the democratisation of Malaysia through the prism of Dr Mahathir, Islam and “other unexpected midwives”, drawing from his book Mahathir’s Islam: Mahathir Mohamad on Religion and Modernity in Malaysia, to be launched at the opening of the forum.

An abiding argument in the 1990s is that Dr Mahathir’s so-called Islamic approach to policy led to the intensification of “Islamisation” of the national administration and the country as a whole, notes Shamsul A.B. of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia in his foreword.

Schottmann at the forum is expected to make the case that, on the contrary, it was Islam in Malaysia that Dr Mahathir modernised.

Arman will examine the push for change and reforms after May 9, including calls to abolish the death penalty, while Praveen will assess the role of civil society and the diaspora.

The collaboration between academia and civil society is expected to draw a full house. – November 2, 2018