FOR a cancer survivor who had initially planned to retire as early as 2013, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin seemed an unlikely candidate to be Prime Minister.
It would not be far-fetched to say the country’s eighth PM landed the plum job quite by accident. Back in early 2020, the ruling Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition was already torn by strife, with one faction wanting to expedite Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s elevation as the then PM Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s successor while another, bitterly opposed to the move.
Muhyiddin was in the latter group and as PH imploded, he joined forces with Datuk Seri Azmin Ali in what became known as the famous “Sheraton Move”, and offered himself to be the country’s eighth PM.
The rest is history as Muhyiddin took office on March 1, propped up mostly by Malay-Muslim MPs, including from Umno, a party which he was sacked as deputy president in 2015.
As the president of Bersatu, the party with the least number of seats in the Dewan Rakyat compared with Umno and PAS, Muhyiddin’s grip on power was tenuous. To ensure loyalty, he appointed a bloated Cabinet and handed out plush jobs in GLCs to lawmakers in his Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition.
At the same time, cracks within PH started to widen as it found itself suddenly booted from Putrajaya after merely 22 months there. As DAP, PKR, Amanah and loyalists of Dr Mahathir squabbled over who should be the opposition’s PM-designate, Muhyiddin consolidated his power, as he postponed the Dewan Rakyat sitting, changed the legislature’s Speaker and orchestrated political coups in several states.
It helped that the yang Di-Pertuan Agong is not someone easily swayed by Anwar Ibrahim’s claims of having a “strong, formidable and convincing” majority support from lawmakers to topple Muhyiddin.
But the most important factor in Muhyiddin’s staying power came from an unexpected source: the Covid-19 pandemic.
Citing health considerations, Muhyiddin in March last year postponed the Dewan Rakyat sitting and this gave him time to once again consolidate his grip of power.
As the Covid-19 pandemic worsened, Umno, eager to wrest back power, had no choice but to contend with putting off a snap poll until the national health crisis eased. The Sabah election in September last year had shown that holding a poll during Covid-19 was a bad move.
But as Umno ramped up the pressure on Muhyiddin as one Umno MP after another withdrew their support towards him earlier this month, the PM threw his trump card: he advised the Agong to declare a state of Emergency.
With Parliament suspended and a near absolute power to do anything he pleases, the Emergency gives Muhyiddin breathing space to regain his grip on Putrajaya. Between now and the end of the Emergency, Muhyiddin, the politician seemingly with nine lives, has little to worry about being undermined by his own allies. What happens after that is anyone’s guess. – Jan 23, 2021
Julian Tan is an avid FocusM reader.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
