PRIME Minister Anwar Ibrahim needs to address the trust deficit facing the unity government if it hopes to regain Malay support, political experts said.

Political analyst Chin Chong Foh said the recent Selangor election results showed the majority of Malays who had supported DAP or Umno in the past had deserted Pakatan Harapan (PH) and Barisan Nasional.

In the August 12 six-state polls, PH regained Penang, Selangor and Negri Sembilan but lost its two-thirds majority in Selangor. Perikatan Nasional (PN) held on to Kelantan, Terengganu and Kedah.

“There’s a trust deficit with the unity government,” Chin said, adding this posed a significant challenge for Anwar.

He said there were two reasons for the Malays to lose faith in Anwar.

The first, Chin said, was that the Malays had fallen for the PN narrative, which exploited the race, religion and royalty (3R) issues. The Malay voters were also made to believe that the Anwar administration did not represent the interests of Muslims.

He said the second was Anwar’s anti-corruption stand, which the Malays said was hypocritical as he was associating with people who are on trial for corruption – the most glaring example being Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who is also deputy prime minister.

“Although PH retained power in the three states, it has lost ground significantly,” he said.

Economic woes and cost of living

Another political analyst, Tang Ah Chai, said the Malays were more affected by the economic downturn triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic than the other races in the country.

He said that was why Anwar must tackle the problems besetting the national economy if the ruling coalition wanted to claw back the support of the Malays and stop PN’s advance before the next general election.

He said there were many reasons for the dramatic shift of Malay votes to the opposition in the state elections, but tackling the economic woes and cost of living of the people should be given priority.

He said if Anwar could get the economy on an even keel and ease the financial strain of the people, it would stop PN’s exploitation of the 3R issues to win support.

“People can’t live on race and religion alone,” Tang told The Malaysian Insight.

He said failure to address the economic problems faced by the ordinary people – everyday things such as ensuring sufficient supply of eggs or chicken – would not only give PN the reason to accuse the government of being a failure but also embolden it to further exploit the race and religion issues.

However, Tang warned that the ruling coalition should not to go down the same path as PN and fight fire with fire.

“The unity government shouldn’t follow the path taken by PN,” he said.

“The way forward is, fix the economy, adopt a moderate political stand and continue to fight corruption and abuse of power.”

Lau Zhe Wei, an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at International Islamic University Malaysia, agreed with Tang’s view that Anwar should focus on the economy to encounter PN’s advance.

“The problem is that most Malays feel that Anwar is self-indulgent and disconnected from public opinion,” Lau said.

“The prime minister may have claimed that the economy is improving, but the majority of Malays feel it hasn’t as food prices are still high, jobs are scarce and the ringgit continues to depreciate.” – August 22, 2023.