PAKATAN Harapan can only reinvent itself by replacing its old leaders with the next generation, said analysts.

“The leadership generation now should gracefully exit the scene gradually, while the second layer of leadership, such as those of Rafizi Ramli, Fahmi Fadzil, Liew Chin Tong, Yeo Bee Yin, to name a few, be given greater space to introduce the new narrative for Malaysia.

“It is time for Anwar Ibrahim, Lim Guan Eng and Mohamad Sabu to groom new leaders and leave the leadership scene,” said International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) political science lecturer Dr Tunku Mohar Tunku Mohd Mokhtar.

Tunku Mohar was commenting on the past week’s political turmoil that ended with PH losing the federal government and the Johor government. Three other PH state governments – Kedah, Perak and Malacca – are expected to fall this week.

Universiti Sains Malaysia’s Dr Azmil Tayeb said PH politicians who still harp on the old politics of race and religion should make way for younger leaders with fresh ideas.

“It means people like Dr Mahathir (former prime minister and Pakatan Harapan chairman Dr Mahathir Mohamad), Anwar, Lim Kit Siang, etc, should retreat from the political scene to give space for young leaders to promote their ideas of a new Malaysia.”

Azmil said the new Perikatan Nasional is already a 97% single race coalition and PH has to build on its multi-ethnic identity to contrast against Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s government.

“The component parties must set aside their narrow interests and formulate an agenda that will benefit all Malaysians, especially those who are marginalised.

“More importantly, PH needs to change the political narrative of race and religion and not play into the hands of Umno and PAS,” said Azmil.

Incoherent Pakatan

Although the coalition was in government for more than 22 months, PH failed to establish a common agenda and objectives beyond winning the elections, said Azmil.

“Each component acted based on its own self-interest and there was almost no effort to reconcile the various party interests. This effort should have been carried out before GE14 and not after.

“The real work starts after winning the election and the lack of cohesion and direction really hampered the work PH government tried to do in the past two years,” said the political science lecturer.

Tunku Mohar said although PKR, DAP and Amanah shared similar political orientations, they failed to translate this into policy.

“While PKR can be labelled as a centrist party, DAP is left to centre and Amanah is right to centre, in terms of what political scientists call political spectrum.

“Then came Bersatu, which is made out of disgruntled Umno leaders and members to organise themselves politically. They are used to right-wing politics as their political raison d’etre.

“Joining Pakatan, they tried to change it into a right to centre party.

“However, as Pakatan ruled the administration, Bersatu could not agree with some policies that were meant to be centrist, fully aware that this can turn away their support base. Instead of socialising the political base to the new realities in Malaysia Baru, they moved back from centre to the right,” said Tunku Mohar.

Distrust among partners

But the match in the gunpowder keg, said Tunku Mohar, was the Anwar versus Azmin Ali battle in PKR.

“PKR’s refusal to act against Azmin backfired as he managed to drag just enough MPs away to bring the whole government down.

“Furthermore, the inability to institutionalise party consultation among its component parties gave rise to the growing ethnic suspicion between Bersatu and DAP.

“With Dr Mahathir and Anwar failing to moderate the inter-party squabbles, the distrust grew until it became easy for Bersatu’s hardliners to take the party out of Pakatan,” said Tunku Mohar. – March 3, 2020.