No one can force Mahathir to hand over in 6 months

Anthony Loke said something that no one believes. He acknowledges that many parties may still harbour suspicion for Mahathir because he has not kept his promise to hand over the prime ministership to Anwar. This distrust stretches back to 1998 where Mahathir not only did not hand over the prime ministership to Anwar, he even sacked Anwar and put him to jail. That was Mahathir’s way of eliminating a threat he deemed most imminent compared to the past deputy prime minister candidates.

Further, most people have a recent memory in Mahathir delaying his decision to hand over. Even though the succession to Anwar within a 2-year timeline formed a core part of PH’s acceptance of BERSATU into the coalition, Mahathir has changed his mind more than once.

In November 2018, Mahathir lengthened this expectation to 2 and a half years. A little over a month later, he said the 2-year timeline is hard to fulfil. Fast forward to July 2019, more and more MPs from BERSATU, UMNO, and PAS had urged Mahathir to stay on for the full term. A month later in August 2019, Mahathir said that it might extend to 3 years. Right to November 2019, he said that it is generally difficult to set a timeline for handover in any case.

All this came to a boil during Sheraton. In case we forget, Mahathir prepared the early seeds for Sheraton by denouncing the succession issue and appealing to his desire of having a Malay-centric coalition where the multiracial elements (DAP and PKR) are eliminated. That way, Anwar will also not be there. After all, Anwar was too liberal for Mahathir’s liking.

The suspicion against Mahathir fulfilling his promise this time is certainly founded. Many facts support this.

Therefore, if we want to make sure that it will work this time, the mechanism to ensure the promise must be adhered to must be foolproof.

Anthony Loke had two suggestions. One, for PKR to withdraw their support for Mahathir if Mahathir does not hand over within 6 months, and this will cause the government to fall. Two, force a snap election.

These two mechanisms not only are unworkable, but they are also highly undesirable.

The first option has a big flaw since it assumed that Mahathir had to rely on PKR’s 38 seats forever. All Mahathir wanted now is not to make PKR their permanent allies, but to only use PKR’s number of seats, so he gets to become prime minister again. Then, Mahathir will try everything that he can to make sure he pulls enough former BERSATU members, UMNO, PAS, and GPS members to replace the numbers of PKR. Worse, he will also kick out DAP at that point.

Mahathir’s main aim was to take revenge against Muhyiddin, whom he felt had betrayed him. That is why Mahathir would make public proclamations to demean Muhyiddin, things he would do only to his arch enemies like Najib in the past. Most of Mahathir’s derogatory comments about the PN government is also mostly directed to Muhyiddin alone.

What this shows is that Mahathir still wants to curry favour among the other MPs (minus Najib and Zahid Hamidi) so that they can even support him when he comes back to power. This also confirms the fact that Mahathir had always wanted the same PN arrangement – with the only difference being he is the prime minister instead of Muhyiddin.

That means, even though PKR has 38 seats, in the event Mahathir does not want to hand over, PKR can withdraw their 38 seats out of government. But Mahathir would already have found 38 seats from other PN components, and he would still be prime minister.

After all, what is needed for Mahathir to stay in power is not PKR or the PH coalition. The prime ministership is centred on whether he has the confidence of the majority. The majority can come from anywhere – without PKR he can still be prime minister.

The second mechanism is also highly flawed. Forcing a snap election is not a viable route. This is because a snap election would only make sense if PKR has a high chance of winning. If PKR goes through the hassle of a snap election – that is costly and unpopular – they will most likely be defeated badly. In that case, Anwar would be in a worse position since not only would he not become prime minister but his party would likely lose many seats in parliament.

Any viable mechanism must be accompanied by a sobering reality check. The reason why Najib and Zahid Hamidi are most excited about a snap election is that they are most confident in winning power. And the forces of UMNO and PAS – together with the fragmentation of PH – means that PN will likely triumph impressively.

Therefore, if there is no real likelihood of winning an election, there is also no option of a snap election. If it is not even an option, it can’t even qualify as a mechanism.

No one can force Mahathir to hand over after 6 months. Not even anything black and white. The only mechanism is to make sure he is not handed the prime ministership again.

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