This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on October 15, 2018

The road Anwar must take after his resounding polls win

What is the takeaway from the Port Dickson by-election?

For one, support for Pakatan Harapan cuts across ethnic lines.

Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim declared moments after being announced the winner that a higher majority was a vote of confidence for the ruling Pakatan and the favourable support came from all ethnic groups.

Well, Port Dickson is what we call a mixed seat. Out of the 75,770 registered voters, 43% are Malays, 33% Chinese, Indians making up 22% and other ethnic groups 2%. In a nutshell, the constituency is not dominated by one ethic group.

Pakatan has always been comfortable and will continue to do well in mixed seats — urban as well as suburban.

Hence in the mixed seat of Port Dickson, religious and racial issues were not easily exploited to bag votes.

So we have PAS, “standing in” for Umno/Barisan Nasional (BN) — which sat out the by-election — as the “defenders of Islam and Malays”, but not doing well despite coming in second in a field of seven candidates.

In fact its candidate Lt Kol (Rtd) Mohd Nazari Mokhtar was only about 2,000 votes short of losing his deposit. To state the obvious, the votes he got from Malays and army personnel in the military camp in Port Dickson (who are mostly Malays) were simply not enough.

Reason? One, as said earlier,  most Malays in Port Dickson did not buy into the “defending Islam/Malay” rhetoric. Two, according to political analysts, Umno/BN supporters had shifted to Pakatan and three, again according to analysts, Umno/BN supporters did not vote.

In short, Port Dickson with its mixed ethnic composition is one constituency that does not favour PAS. But this is not taking anything away from Anwar and his colleagues in the Pakatan coalition who worked hard to get the thumping win in Port Dickson.

Also, the presence of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad lifted the Pakatan campaign and the premier played a big role in Anwar getting a big victory.

Still, the hard work for Pakatan will “as always” be in the Malay heartland of Kelantan and Terengganu.

The “defending Islam and the Malay race” rhetoric continues to be played by PAS and, of course, Umno.

To author KeeThuan Chye, religion has become “so divisive as a factor in Malaysian society”. He was quoted in an Al Jazeera report as saying: “He [Anwar] will have to moderate it and he is the best person to do that because of his Islamic credentials. If he is to do this country a favour then he must use this credibility to bring about a Malaysia that is less fundamentalist in its approach to Islam”.

The Islamic credentials Kee was referring to are obviously Anwar’s days as leader of the Muslim Youth Movement of Malaysia or ABIM youth or ABIM  — the credentials that prompted Dr Mahathir then in his first stint as prime minister in the 1980s,  to persuade Anwar to join the Umno he led, seeing him as a useful ally to ward off fundamentalist or rather extremist Islam.

Going by Kee’s remarks then, Anwar ought to be back to where it all began, that is to help Dr Mahathir and the nation in bringing about a Malaysia where Islam and other religions are practised side by side without tension.

Incidentally, the Al Jazeera report which featured Kee was published a day before the Port Dickson by-election. And even then Al Jazeera had opined that “after so many decades in the tumult of Malaysian politics, it seems Anwar’s time may finally have arrived”.

And in the same report, veteran politician Lim Kit Siang had this to say: “This is the most historic by-election in the history of Malaysia”, going on to say: “It’s about whether we continue what we did on May 9, Whether we continue to build a better Malaysia”.

Now that Anwar has won, what will he do? Or should it be: what do we want him to do?

As political analyst Dr Oh Ei Sun sees it, Anwar will have “to get back into cabinet and may even replace his wife if Tun Mahathir permits it”.

The wife is of course Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail.

To analyst Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani, the newly elected Port Dickson member of parliament “is hoping the momentum from this by-election will drive him towards becoming the next prime minister.” But the key question, according to Asrul, is, “most importantly, will Anwar go back to the drawing board or continue with (Dr) Mahathir’s agenda and policies?”

On the very night the Port Dickson results were announced, political analysts were already talking about reforms he ought to pursue and expecting him to champion centrist politics and continuing the ideology and policies of Pakatan which gave them the 14th general election victory.

Analyst Dr Sivamurugan Pandian feels that Anwar has “to conform with his decision to reform parliament and may suggest to lead a new parliament reform committee and eventually plan a smooth transition as the next PM”.

And Sivamurugan also says that Anwar “should consider a nationwide tour to silence his critics by interacting with the masses on his Malaysia Agenda”, although as Sivamurugan sees it, “some will continue to criticise the timing [of such a tour]”.

Detractors have been accusing Anwar of “being in a hurry to be PM”, an accusation made since his release from prison right up to the Port Dickson by-election. The attacks are continuing.

But talking of critics, some of them anyway seem to be taking a “softer” stance following the Port Dickson election. Stopping short of supporting Anwar, they now seem to be willing to give the man a “chance”.

One of his fiercest critics, the fiery lawyer Siti Kasim, who opposed Anwar’s “PD move” and warned us of “his radical past” said: “Anwar must lead the Malays out of their extreme religious existence and into modernity” and “it’s time for him to perform”.

Whether we agree with the lawyer or otherwise, one will surely concur with the “must  perform” part .

By the way, the last thing Anwar needs now is to shoot himself in the foot.

Mohsin Abdullah is a contributing editor at The Edge. He has covered politics for more than four decades.