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Can Pak Lah be safe after Dr Mahathir steps down?

SOMETHING IS AFOOT. DATO' SERI Mahathir Mohamed does not accept he has about a month as Prime Minister. The packers and movers have not cleared his desk and official residence. He is in control. His successor, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, has to defer to him on policy and party, which makes him look a man who does not or cannot assert his authority. Nothing he did in recent months suggest he is about to give up power. He cannot remain Prime Minister after October without untold political damage to UMNO, the National Front (BN), and the government he leads. So he would resign as scheduled. But he would also remain in charge. He is paranoic about the skeletons in his cupboard, which if made public or if he is forced to confront them, what little respect future historians and generations have for him would be washed away.

The Merdeka Day parade at Putra Jaya on 31 August 2003 was his official sendoff, a grateful nation thanking him for his three decades of leadership, two as Prime Minister. But there was a forced grandeur about it. In the background were the ghosts of his failures - he has to his credit, when all is said and done, more failures and disasters than successes - to dampen what was to have been a happy sendoff. He must have sensed that soon enough. He waits for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference summit in Putra Jaya in October, but a pall hangs over it. The Middle East is in a boiling cauldron, after the US invasion of Iraq, and the Summit is where harsh and anti-US statements would have to be made. Many OIC members are unhappy at this prospect. So far less than a dozen have said they would attend. The prospect of a postponement should not be dismissed out of hand.

Amidst this uncertainty, Dr Mahathir has taken some firm decisions. The Mahathir Library in Putra Jaya is complete. That would be where he would direct events - he believes he can as he has since 1981 - and he interviews staff. Every one of his private staff have been offered positions. One official when Pak Lah is Prime Minister, he would have to bring in his staff into an office devoid of a past. Many UMNO stalwarts, in office and out, believe Dr Mahathir is not about to give up power: he would resign as Prime Minister but not as UMNO President. How he could do this is not clear, but UMNO believes this is how Dr Mahathir would hover as an unwelcome ghost over Pak Lah. If this is what he wants, he had better think it through. There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip.

The last time a plan of this sort was put into practice was when Tun Datu Mustpha bin Datu Harun, then Sabah chief minister and president of USNO, United Sabah National Organisation, in the 1970s, made Tan Sri (later Tun and governor) Said Keruak chief minister but held on as USNO president. Tan Sri Said was a lap dog to the Tun, blamed for setbacks and mishaps but not credit for successes which went to the Tun. It did not work. Tan Sri Said did not come on his own until he rebelled, in the genteel indirect way he had to the by now politically irrelevant Tun, and came on his own. By the time the Tun was a spent force. Now few remember him except to discuss the excesses of his time in power and office. It is a replay of what Dr Mahathir has in mind.

I had heard that Pak Lah had decided he would now choose Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, not his preferred choice, Tan Sri Muhiyuddin Yassin, as his deputy prime minister. As a first step, Dato' Seri Najib would be made home minister. This is what Dr Mahathir wanted all along, but Pak Lah had baulked. If Dr Mahathir's plans are as I have heard, this would make sense. Dr Mahathir clearly could trust no one in the new Pak Lah lineup. But he can Dato' Seri Najib. And it would kill two birds with one stone. Dr Mahathir owes a cultural debt - 'hutang budi', as the Malay acknowledges it - to Tun Razak. This also gives Dato' Seri Najib a new lease of political life. It is also his last chance to make a stab to follow his father into the highest political office in the land.

If this comes about, Pak Lah would be reduced, as prime minister, as Dato' Seri Abu Hassan Omar was as foreign minister, as postman to Dr Mahathir. But could Dr Mahathir pull it off? He could so long as Pak Lah and UMNO would allow it. If they do, Dr Mahathir would have power without responsibility. He does not want to stop a witchhunt after he leaves. Early this week, Pak Lah led a BN and UMNO team to discuss the Sabah UMNO and BN candidates for the state assembly election there. Dr Mahathir had wanted election there first before calling for it in the other states and parliament. But he was stopped in his tracks when PAS, which controls two states, Kelantan and Trengganu, said it would dissolve the state assemblies in the two states in tandem with Sabah.

The arrogant Kuala Lumpur control of Sabah BN and UMNO annoys Sabahans, and there is now a move to reject parties that are based in the peninsular. It turns out Sabah UMNO itself is more divided than Kuala Lumpur had imagined, and Sabah BN smarts at UMNO's insistence it wants to contest in 36 of the 60 state assembly constituencies. This could well be reduced to 31, but the BN parties smart at not being given their due. Parti Bersatu Sabah, which has 14 state assemblymen, is said to be given only ten constituencies, and its youth wing threatens to contest as independents. Sabah sources suggest there would be more independents than in elections past, and if Sabah UMNO is not careful, it could find itself on a sticky wicket indeed.

Should Dr Mahathir go ahead with his reported plans, it could only last until the UMNO General Assembly. Party elections must be held then. It is fair to assume all positions, including the President, would be challenged. This would put Pak Lah at an advantage if he were to stand for the presidency without incumbency. Dr Mahathir must also stand as UMNO president if he wants to wield power behind the scenes. Given the mood in UMNO, he would well face defeat. One supporter of his said Dr Mahathir need not be Senior Minister as Mr Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore; he could control events in power without being in the cabinet. Or, in the Malaysian idiom, a win-win result.

Were it true. UMNO is in serious danger of irrelevance and disappearance. Dr Mahathir fashioned it into his image, and whoever takes it over cannot put things right without causing an internal revolt. Especially as it now begins to dawn on all and sundry that the Mahathir years brought Malaysia to the brink of bankruptcy. The longer he is in political power and control after he steps down, the more damaging the consequences - for UMNO, BN, Pak Lah, Malaysia. The Chinese curse of living in interesting times could well be visited upon UMNO at its general assembly next year. Especially if general election intervenes between now and the General Assembly, if BN does not retain its majority and UMNO losing more ground to PAS.

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@mgg.pc.my