The former deputy prime minister, Anwar Ibrahim, came to celebrate Deepavali with the people of Brickfields, a rare gesture from any politician, as few could remember a similar function there in the past two decades.

Or is it? It does not frighten any more. The BN loses ground every time it does. The Malay is not pleased to learn his child's scholarship is revoked for asking unanswerable questions about official policy. What changed it so dramatically is the Anwar Ibrahim saga. The Malay is incessed that Pak Sheikh is destroyed politically and humiliated culturally. If the BN wanted to destroy him, it should have killed him; but it lost its nerve. It pays the price. He is out of prison, is without doubt Malaysia's most charismatic and populist politician, holding the BN at bay at home and abroad. He is now all but untouchabe.

The UMNO election upsets only showed that the challengers bribed their way to office more efficiently. The challengers were not organised in times past, and those in office, the president's men, had no competiton. Often, the president called his detractors in, bribed him with contracts and jobs and, when that failed, with bankruptcy and worse. If you do not believe this, ask one who refused what was offered: the former deputy president, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

However one looks at it, UMNO is held to ransom by the fratricidal confrontation between Pak Lah and Dr Mahathir. "Bring on the dummies", the good doctor ordered, as he acted to stop Pak Lah in his tracks, and succeeded, his principal lieutenant the deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak. What is more, the dummies won. Pak Lah has to rope in his bitter political enemy who is also Dr Mahathir's, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, to bat for him. All it did is proof that UMNO is now beyond redemption; that Pak Lah cannot depend on Pak Sheikh for his future; that the infighting within will break UMNO asunder; that if Dr Mahathir would not destroy Pak Lah, Pak Sheikh would; and all the wealth of Malaysia cannot put UMNO together ever again.

Contrast this with the crowds of the man of the moment, Anwar Ibrahim. A special branch officer among the guests, and no doubt on duty, thought 12,500 were at the open house, and possibly 20,000 the day. Even that is an exaggeration. it was crowded, but there was not the space to accommodate even the official estimates to prove it a failure. The toilet room joke of big is better is now anchored in politics.

Nowhere was this so baldly reflected than in the two Open Houses of the jailed former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim. That he is released causes sleepless nights for many a senior UMNO leader. UMNO has decided he should never sully its doors ever again. But he nevertheless spreads terror and mayhem in equal proportions in UMNO. He had his Open House at his home in Cherok Tok Kun in Permatang Pauh the same day as the prime minister and UMNO president, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, in neighbouring Kepala Batas, called on him first, and set political tongues wagging, frightening UMNO politicians, with political explanations to suggest both a new political alliance to destroy the deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, to a pre-emptive political takeover of UMNO in a Machiavellian bid to tip Pak Lah over. The simple explanation – that he did the neighbourly thing as custom demands, and to thank him in person for his release – was too blase to be taken seriously. A week after the event, Pak Lah had to insist that it was a friendly, not a political, call and nothing of consequence was discussed.

At this time, Dr Mahathir's trusted deputy prime minister, Anwar Ibrahim, decided enough was enough. The cronies were out of control, and he decided they must be reined in. They were not about to allow that, pressured Dr Mahathir to act against his protege. Which he promptly did but which confronted Malay feudal sensitivities for humiliating a feudal chief in 1998.

Surely, the issue is more. Bribery exists at all levels of society. All governments and political parties can do is to restrict it with laws and rules enforced strictly so one would think carefully before one accepted a bribe. It would be a foolhardy UMNO politician if, as a businessman, he bribes his way to run a factory in Singapore. He would see the inside of a prison that would be denied him in half a dozen lifetimes in his country across the causeway. Unless, of course, he is Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who would be thrown in jail, as he was, in Malaysia for revealing the corrupt world UMNO and the government it leads is. Where the UMNO-led coalition government went wrong was when it stalled all allegations and reports of money politics even when his cabinet colleagues talked about its prevalence. If Pak Lah had a police investigation of the claims of the Pahang mentri besar and the information minister, and a thorough inquiry into the oft repeated calls to do so at the general assembly, UMNO would not in the sticky wicket it is in now.

The National Front party presidents then decided if the UMNO leader could, so could they. As the electoral rules were framed in UMNO to prevent other than the incumbents to be elected, so did the coalition partners rush to follow suit. The UMNO president helped in the other party elections by clearly stating his preference as leader, almost always the incumbent. Not unsurprisingly, this geriatric cabal in time represented no one not even, unsurprisingly, themselves. The coalition became a vehicle to beat its communities with. Until it imploded from within. There was no danger of that then, and dissidents could be brought in line with evidence of their corruption or misdoing, sexual or otherwise. It worked every time until the deputy president of UMNO, who questioned what he should not, in National Front amity, question. When that defiance had more support than assumed, he had to be destroyed. What happened after became, despite the tragic consequences, a comedy of errors. Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim was sacked, detained under the Internal Security Act, beaten to a pulp by the Inspector-General of Police no less, jailed for corruption and sodomy in a trial in the Malayan courts that was closer to Judge Jeffreys' court than Solomon's.

The New Straits Times is his megaphone as the Star is the MCA president, Dato' Ong Ka Ting's. The Utusan Malaysia group, led by a different UMNO faction, often descends into the sycophancy which costs the mainstream newspapers dear. I have known cabinet ministers to tear their hair in frustration, when UMNO divisions hold their elections and they are ignored. The deputy prime minister and UMNO deputy president, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, is an "enemy", so the press ignore him. When it reports on a convicted politician's desire to mend bridges with Pak Lah, the UMNO ground sees it as an unholy alliance to dislodge the deputy prime minister from his perch. It probably is not but Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim has not lost his political skills in prison, and any act which unnerves UMNO and its leaders is fair game.

It is into this cauldron that the former deputy prime minister, recently released from prison, steps in. Dato' Seri Anwar was carried into prison screaming that he was imprisoned for his political views and ambition, but he had to be silenced for the damage, if his views carried, to UMNO's and BN's political future. But damage he did. He emerged from prison six years to the day he was expelled from UMNO in 1998, outwardly stronger now than then. He held his ground throughout, especially when he insisted on microsurgical orthopaedic treatment in Munich, his health declined dangerously, but passions had been inflamed so high that the government blinked, the political consequences of his death in custody too much of a political risk.

There is a fear to stand out in a crowd, especially when he who does is marked. So Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim are enemies of the people because they have fallen out of political favour with UMNO; The opposition is useless because it cannot, election after election, match the resources of the National Front, which should be supported for ever because it has been re-elected every time since 1955. But Edison, the inventor of the electric bulb, failed in his experiments 2,998 out of 3,000! It is this urge to go on in face of impending disaster that makes one want to can suceed.

The UMNO elections last month did not go the way Pak Lah wanted. The highhandedness en route to the party election caused much offence in the UMNO ground. It turned into a divisive fight for control of the Umno heartland, between the Pak Lah faction which believed the heartland is as it defined, and the rest grouted in an odd coalition of anti-Pak forces, which included backers of the deputy prime minister, Najib, Dr Mahathir, Tengku Razaleigh, and the former deputy prime minister-turned-convict, Anwar Ibrahim, believing in the common view that the heartland is rooted in Malay culture and soul. Bribery or, as Umno coyly describes it, money politics, came into play as never before, the stakes for invidual politicians and interest groups so high that the rumours that as much as RM500 million was spent by the leading players is grouted on impirical but unprovable evidence. No one, giver or recipient of bribers, is about to advertise it or attest before an Umno disciplinary committee. But the winners believed there was none as those who lost insisted there was.

UMNO, and the BN coalition it leads, is caught in a crisis from which escape is all but impossible if it does not reform. But reform it cannot for all that would do is strengthen the internal political forces in each coalition party against its leaders. The party members are fed up of being ignored, and are not averse to challenge what their leaders have to say. If that is not enough, the recent release from jail of Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, arguable the most potent political force now, has shaken the BN to its core. It dissembles as each leader ducks from the fallout of his political presence. The BN and UMNO leaders react in panic to this, as he reaffirms as Malaysia's charismatic political force, and another imponderable for the BN and UMNO to overcome.

That man is Anwar Ibrahim, the jailed former deputy prime minister, who resumes a political career after his recent release from prison. He emerges larger-than-life. He is ignored by the Malaysian government and media. The opposition, which once made him its mascot, now look askance at his indelible presence. He cannot re-enter politics until April 2008, the legal restraint of any man released from prison, but is feted here and overseas as a man to watch. After his surgery in Munich, world leaders called on him, telephoned or sent messages. The Yang Dipertuan Besar of Negri Sembilan, a former king, and his consort had lunch with him in Munich. So the Sultan of Brunei in Jeddah. A few sultans either spoke by telephone or sent emissaries. He moved to Saudi Arabia after his surgery, as guest of the King, and returns on 31 October.

THE FORMER MALAYSIAN PRIME prime minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed, was asked to partake in money politics in 1974, in his bid to be UMNO vice-president. He would have none of it, and came in third. He is not correct here in his recollections: He was on the then UMNO president, Tun Abdul Razak's preferred list of three vice-presidents, and his list was returned. Be that as it may, what he said about money politics and vote buying is true. It is equally true that UMNO leaders tolerated it. Within two years, Dr Mahathir was deputy minister, and prime minister in seven. But he did nothing to reduce its spread. He now has a spin to it now: "If you think that corruption is very bad, your friend has to go. I had to decide against my friend once, you know." He admits, offhandedly, that the only corruption he was prepared to make an issue of was the corruption for which his "friend", Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim was unceremoniously sacked, detained under the Internal Security Act, beaten to a pulp by the Inspector-General of Police no less, convicted in a series of trials that continue to raise doubts about the equitability of Malaysian justice.

There are two reasons for this: one is the former BN and UMNO president, and prime minister for 22 years, Tun Mahathir Mohamed; the other is his once-friend and now arch enemy, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim. Their mortal combat in 1998 began the slow and deliberate destruction of BN and UMNO. The two unlikely foes must unite before BN and UMNO could unite once more in strength. Especially when divisions within BN and UIMNO reflect this mortal combat. Could that happen? Could an iron tree bloom?

THE DEPUTY INTERNAL SECURITY minister, Dato, Noh Omar, goes about with state secrets in his pocket (The Star, 14 October 2004, Nation, p27). He has the full run of secrets in his ministry, but he is a bit lost because Malaysians do not understand his role in keeping this nation safe from the likes of Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Jemaah Islamiyah, Party SeIslam Malaysia (PAS), Democratic Action Party (DAP), Parti Keadilan Rakyat (KeADILan), Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, corrupt police men. He is the point man in this eternal battle; his minister doubles up as prime minister and finance minister, and is otherwise involved in other issues. There is therefore no one left to mind the internal security store. Yet UMNO and Malaysia are ungrateful, and do not recognise his talents.

If he does not act, he would be embroiled in needless turf battles with Dato' Seri Najib. He is on the defensive now. He has annoyed the Mahathir, Najib, Anwar Ibrahim camps, who are against him because he is not with them. It is an odd role for the prime minister and UMNO president to be in. He has to spend his waking hours to get out of their clutches. His position gets the worse by the day for he does not act as he must. He lets things slide, compensating action with words so impotent as to be ignored. He should not delay naming the ten UMNO supreme council members, reshuffling his cabinet and the party heirarcy with fresh blood and retiring the others. He must set a new agenda in which the larger public good must take precedence over UMNO. If he does not, he would not last the next UMNO election in 2007, and forgotten as swiftly. He deserves more than that. But would he do what must?

But this is not enough. His role in his son's involvement in the nucear arms scandal is not as innocent as he insists. How is it that his name is involved, in his present predicament, in one company but not the others. More important, he is alleged to have got the Iraq oil vouchers when he was deputy prime minister. His denial from Hanoi suggests that while he may be innocent, the others are not. Petronas, Javala Corporation and others mentioned have kept quiet, hoping silence is golden. It is not. Corruption, as the Anwar trials defined, is also misuse of power and authority. All this denial has shown is that in this Pak Lah is as guilty as Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim. Why has it come to that? Because those in charge use power to destroy those who threaten their powerbase, or favour their favourites. In other words, their actions, despite Pak Lah's call, are not an open book. When power is used this way, it could, and often does, turn against those who use it. As it has now. That is Pak Lah's dilemma

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