COMMENT | It’s a simple question: Do you want to be a viable government-in-waiting? Or are you content to remain in the opposition indefinitely?

Ultimately, this is what all the other questions facing former BN parties boil down to.

Sarawak BN has deserted the coalition, like Sabah BN before it. No one in MCA, MIC, or Gerakan has any genuine love for Umno.

Thus, I suppose Padang Rengas MP Nazri Abdul Aziz is right - BN is “gone.” At least BN 1.0, that is.

The question is, what comes next? All of the former BN parties, Umno included, seem to be struggling with this dilemma, and it’s not hard to understand why.

In the end, I believe there are two major ends of the spectrum as far as potential next steps go for these parties, especially on the peninsula.

Option A: Each party can exist exactly as it did before.

Option B: The parties can make some drastic internal changes.

I believe Option A leads to a long stint as the opposition, while Option B leads to becoming a potential government-in-waiting as early as the next general election.

Who’s to blame?

The original BN formula worked at the dawn of Malaysian independence - one party for each major ethnic group, with a fairly equitable distribution.

Over time, things became more and more Umno-centric. Towards the end, parties like MCA and MIC existed more to provide the external semblance of multiracialism - a paper-thin legitimisation of the BN government.

Everyone stayed in for the easy money though, which is what ultimately propped up the entire facade.

When the tap dried up, and it all inevitably came tumbling down, the component parties wasted no time in blaming each other.

So, which is it? Were MCA, MIC et cetera useless? Or did Umno drag them down?

The reality is that both were true. Non-Umno parties clung to the Umno rock to get elected, but that same rock eventually dragged the whole coalition down.

Read more: The disintegration of BN - from 13 parties to four

The other important truth is: None of that matters anymore. No one outside those parties gives a rat’s behind whose “fault” it was.

To bicker on about it is infantile and useless beyond measure. All that matters now is how you want to navigate the future.

The fate of a mono-ethnic Umno

In Option A, Umno remains exclusively Malay, and has the same ethnocentric, fearmongering, and racist attitude it has had for decades.

On one hand, Umno will always be able to win some votes, and some seats, this way. They are not unlike PAS in this regard.

On the other, they will never, ever rule Malaysia again.

Historically, Malaysians like coalition-based politics. The past does not limit the future, but empirically, this seems to be the general preference in the here and now.

If Umno continues unchanged along its racist path, who on earth is going to ally themselves with Umno?

The likes of Umno supreme council member Tajuddin Abdul Rahman can jump up and down like an excited child and scream “PAS! PAS!”

Well and good. Such a partnership can maybe win a few more seats that way, assuming after this last election the PAS grassroots don’t throw out every PAS leader who caused their current near-wipeout by being Umno-friendly.

A PAS-Umno victory however, is just about as unlikely as a Umno-only victory.

The math simply will not work out, both in terms of demographics, and in terms of electoral boundaries.

Electoral math

Indeed, the history of gerrymandering is a colourful one.

Some of the early redelineations were done to create mixed, multi-ethnic seats, because it was known that neither PAS nor DAP could ever win in such seats. Non-Malays never voted PAS, and Malays never voted DAP, so BN won huge majorities in Parliament.

Some years later, they had to employ the exact opposite formula, as all the mixed seats started going to the opposition - so they squeezed all the non-Malays into as few constituencies as humanly possible.

Under Harapan, it seems very likely more changes will be made - hopefully not merely to gerrymander to their benefit, but just to create more equitable delineations more generally.

For instance, we were reminded recently that there are more voters in the parliamentary constituency of Damansara, then there are in the entire state of Perlis.

Once these inequalities are addressed, and with no more feasts from which to feed the component parties their scraps off the table, is Umno really so stupid and ignorant of electoral math to believe that they can go it alone?

The option with real potential

In Option B, the voices of those calling for Umno to open up and leave behind ethnic exclusivism (probably cognisant of the political extinction that awaits them otherwise) and the obsession with racism are discarded forever.

Now this creates a whole new game. Under this ideological rubric, every decent person in the former BN may have a new banner they can rally under - one that would not be possible with Umno’s old racism still at the forefront.

When the debilitating burden of race-based politics is rejected in favour of inclusiveness, the opposition of today can redefine themselves around new ideological cores, without all the baggage of the past.

In this scenario, I believe such a multiracial, ideologically progressive opposition can be a force to be reckoned with in any seat in the country.

This empowers them to provide levels of checks and balances that are simply unattainable unless you are a credible threat to the government of the day.

History teaches us that if the government does not feel the opposition actually has a chance of replacing them in any coming elections, they will ultimately have no real reason or motivation whatsoever to be pressured by anything the opposition says.

The right side of history

If the progressives within Umno who want to open the party up can win explicitly with that platform in the coming Umno elections, that would be the best-case scenario.

However, I would go so far to say that if Umno decides to maintain their ethnic exclusivity and racist model, dissenters within the party should simply up and leave.

There are times when it is good to stay loyal to the cause, and keep that same old original fire burning.

Then there are times when you have to let go of the people who simply cannot be persuaded to do the right thing, and move forward by striking out on your own.

History has shown that Bersatu and Amanah made the right choice in this regard. Will the progressives still left in Umno be brave enough to do the same?

NATHANIEL TAN is eager to serve. He wishes everyone Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri! Maaf zahir dan batin.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.