Parti Keadilan Rakyat (Keadilan) the yet-to-be-approved entity formed from the new party born out of reformasi, Parti Keadilan Nasional and the old left-wing party with roots in the anti-colonialist struggle, Parti Rakyat Malaysia has a place in Malaysia's future.

This is because of the nature of Keadilan as a political party. Unlike the major Barisan Nasional component parties Umno, MCA and MIC Keadilan is multiracial in its composition. Its raison d'etre is not for championing the rights of one over another, or to engage in divide and rule policies, but for a truly Malaysian cause.

Of course, there are other parties, such as Gerakan, DAP and PPP which have tried to find a niche in multiracial politics, but they have all failed in one way or another.

Gerakan showed promise during its establishment it combined the Malay intellectual Syed Hussein Al Attas, Mr Opposition Tan Chee Khoon, Lim Chong Eu of the United Democratic Party and V Veerapan of the Labour Party, among others.

However, it soon became more of a Chinese party (as the results of the 1969 elections showed) and its slide into being another ethno-centric party was reinforced when it decided to join BN. Since then it has battled with MCA to win primacy as the Chinese voice, while at the same time trying to appear to be the more liberal conscience of the ruling coalition.

Gerakan's main market continues to be the liberal, middle class and English educated Chinese. Presently, S Vijayaratnam is the only non-Chinese Malaysian on the central committee.

The other former major multi-racial party which has joined BN is PPP - which, in many ways, is now the Indian equivalent of Gerakan. Founded by the Seenivasagam brothers in Perak, the party under the helm of M Kayveas currently attempts to oust MIC as being the primary Indian voice within BN and that has made its multi-racial ideal being subjected to mere meaningless rhetoric.

Chinese-based DAP

Prior to the establishment of Keadilan, DAP has been the major multiracial party in the opposition. Yet despite remaining outside of BN, DAP has failed to effectively project itself outside its traditional urban Chinese base although it has had a spattering of national successes and Indian Malaysians have over the years won seats on a DAP ticket.

But even prominent non-Chinese Malaysian figures like Karpal Singh won on general Chinese support; such is the demographics in Malaysia where there is no real Indian majority area.

Yet today, DAP does not seem to be reaching out far enough beyond its natural constituency (as seen by its sheer obsession with the Islamic state issue), and is wrecked by being dominated too long by figures such as Karpal himself and also Lim Kit Siang. The older generation in the party, used to the struggles of the 70s and 80s, now find it difficult to assert their relevance to a more racially-liberalised Malaysia.

Younger, charismatic figures such as Teng Chang Khim and also those who are more supportive of the Barisan Alternatif coalition such as the Triang branch and several former DAP stalwarts in Penang have been marginalised by the party apparatus.

That is why, many observers have the impression that younger Chinese Malaysians are more attracted to Keadilan rather than DAP they want a more inclusive party, not compelled to sliding into politics of chauvinism and racism simply for the sake of survival. Perhaps the younger Chinese Malaysians understand the reality of Malaysia and where it is heading.

DAP will never truly be a multi-racial party if it cannot understand the Malays, and due to dwindling percentage of Chinese Malaysians, their insistence on continuing to ferment Chinese-based issues alone will make it further irrelevant in the future.

Compared to the above parties, rarely have people acknowledged Keadilan's success in building a multiracial leadership for its party - the most balanced compared to the other political parties in the country.

Here, the party's image as a rainbow coalition is most evidenced bringing together people like former Umno politicians Mohd Ezam Mohd Noor, Azmin Ali and Saifuddin Nasution, opposition stalwarts such as Syed Husin Ali, renowned activists like Irene Fernandez and Tian Chua, figures from the Islamic movements, intellectuals and professionals such as Christina Liew, Abdul Rahman Othman and others that reflects Malaysia's colourful society.

The success Keadilan had achieved in bringing these diverse personalities on one platform should be built upon.

Islam and politics

Islam today has much more prominence in Malaysian politics then it ever was which makes the Umno-PAS rivalry the main political battle in the country. Unlike Umno (which used to be a fervent secular nationalist party but is now trying to achieve a paradox of sorts by reinventing its Islamic credentials along its feudal nationalist ideology) and PAS, Keadilan is multi-religious.

At the same time, it has a good relationship with the Islamic movement Anwar Ibrahim, whose coup de grace created reformasi and whose wife, Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail is now leading Keadilan, is a major figure in the dynamism of the Malaysian Islamic movement.

Keadilan leaders such as Ruslan Kassim, Saari Sungib, Animah Ferrer, Fuziah Salleh, Mustafa Kamil Ayob, Sahri Bahri and Dr Badrulamin Baharon hail from two important groups in the Islamic movement JIM and ABIM. Syeikh Azmi Ahmad on the other hand is the former Penang mufti.

Despite the inclusion of some former participants of the Islamic movements in Keadilan, the party has urged a focus on restoring immediate social, political and economic fundamentals in the country, rather than simply focusing on the Islamic state.

Keadilan's approach has been to adopt the fiqh awaliyyat (jurisprudence of priorities) advocated by eminent contemporary Islamic scholar Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi.

Nevertheless it cannot be denied that Sept 11 (which sealed the fissure between DAP and BA), the subsequent Islamic state declaration by Umno and the responding Islamic state document by PAS has created a tension on the issue of Islam and politics in the country.

One of Keadilan's most imminent challenges for relevance is to take into account the majority of

Muslims who desire to see Islam play a more prominent role in their lives and balancing it with the multicultural dimension of Malaysia.

Being a party which encompasses both those from the progressive Islamist camp and also non-Muslims, Keadilan should be more pro-active to provide leadership on the difficult and delicate issue.

Meanwhile, Keadilan alone is insufficient unless its ally, PAS, decides to focus on the immediate challenge of restoring democracy in the country and not be influenced by Umno's bait on the Islamic state issue.

Grassroots issue

One thing Keadilan needs to learn from PAS however is the need to promote the growth of its grassroots which is quite lacking now. Of course, one has to take into account that Keadilan is a new party (PRM, the older partner in the merged entity did not have extensive grassroots either) and is trying to break the mould with new politics thus to establish grassroots support as well as an efficient electoral machinery is a huge task.

Keadilan needs to focus on the growth of the grassroots and to take its new politics to the people.

Keadilan must also be able to address a multitude of issues for a national audience. At the risk of gross generalisation, it can be said that Anwar is a big issue among the Malays as a whole, democracy is important for the urbanised Malaysians, various issues regarding the media and education are important for the Chinese and the East Malaysians put development as an especially important priority in view of their large swaths of underdeveloped areas.

Communal and regional parties can simply focus on one or two issues, but Keadilan which has the potential to be a major national party needs to be able to address these issues effectively in different constituents. That is political reality.

Keadilan needs to be able to start winning in non-Malay constituencies to reinforce its multicultural image.

Lunas was a good start. Although Keadilan's candidate was Saifuddin Nasution, he managed to win in an area with a significant non-Malay electorate. Mistakes which caused Keadilan the last Sarawak state elections should not be repeated. Here, DAP is most effective the successes they had after 1990 lies more in their appeal on local issues much more than their Malaysian Malaysia creed.

In essence, Keadilan's truly multicultural make-up is important to promote new politics in Malaysia. However, multiculturalism alone, as an ideal, is insufficient without a comprehensive grassroots network.

Democracy, human rights and social justice are important issues to be addressed and have been grossly ignored by BN, yet Keadilan needs to understand that there are other concerns of the Malaysian people for it to win them over and be a truly governing force.

Without doubt, Keadilan has achieved a great degree of success in breaking new ground and has the potential to go much further.

MS ABDUL RAHIM is from Penang and a graduate of a private college. Currently working as a marketing executive in Bayan Lepas, he will be voting for the first time in the next elections.