COMMENT | The winds of change seem to be blowing a little harder than usual these last few days, hinting at a sea change in the world of Malaysian politics.

I believe that one simple question is at the core of these changes: which party will the next few prime ministers of Malaysia come from?

As a point of reference, let us consider the old BN system. The Umno president was the prime pinister, and the party’s deputy president - should he not get fired at some point in his term - invariably becomes the next president, and thus the next prime minister.

The BN system had a thousand flaws, and I would never want to see it make a return; but I’ll admit that in this regard, it was relatively stable and predictable.

The situation is Harapan is manifestly different. We have not one, but two, and maybe even three parties (some may even say four) from whom the candidate of prime minister may be drawn.

More importantly, there is a sense that it is not guaranteed who the eighth PM will be, more so the ninth PM, and which party he or she will be from, even if Harapan continues to win.

I think this is the primary backdrop against which we should understand the political currents presently in play.

Bersatu: Centre or periphery?

Let’s analyse each of these three parties in turn, starting with Bersatu - the party of our present PM.

Bersatu holds the PM’s post, and five other cabinet posts, while holding only 13 seats in Parliament.

PKR, DAP and Umno all hold about 50 seats each, with the former two taking up seven and six cabinet posts, respectively.

Dr Mahathir Mohamed has openly declared many times that PKR president-elect Anwar Ibrahim will succeed him in the PM’s post.

However, three things remain uncertain - if this will actually happen, when it will happen if it does, and who Anwar’s successor would be, should he become PM.

In the event that Harapan stays as it is, there are two main possibilities: Scenario A, where the PM always comes from the same party (like it was in BN, but this time with Bersatu instead of Umno), or an unprecendented Scenario B, where the PM comes from different parties.

Scenario B has a number of subdivisions:

  • B1: the PM’s post rotates between Bersatu and PKR
  • B2: the PM’s post rotates between multiple or all of the Harapan component parties according to a predetermined sequence and rota
  • B3: the candidate for PM and his or her party is determined in an ad hoc manner every election.

Then there is a hybrid of Scenario A and B (let’s call it Scenario AB), where the eighth PM is from a party besides Bersatu, and henceforth comes only from that party. An example may be that Anwar becomes the next PM, and every Harapan PM thereafter is also from PKR.

I imagine that those within Bersatu are looking to avoid Scenario AB, as in the long term, this would almost certainly relegate them permanently to second fiddle at best, and to complete irrelevancy at worst.

As JRR Tolkien understood well, people who gain power often find it very hard to let it go.

Scenario B3 would mean a significant and probably highly disruptive instability.

Scenario A, while preferable to many within Bersatu and their sympathisers, would likely mean reneging on a crucial promise (of handing over the reins to Anwar), resulting in a potentially huge backlash.

Scenarios B1 and B2 are something of a middle ground; but to ensure even this, Bersatu may need more bargaining power and leverage than it would have post-Mahathir.

Will Anwar use Umno as leverage against Bersatu?

If I had to guess PKR’s biggest fear currently, I would say that it was Scenario A - where future PMs come from Bersatu.

I am the last person who can judge the validity of the following fears, but I imagine some see a number of signs suggesting that Mahathir and Bersatu may be planning to engineer a scenario where Anwar never becomes PM.

There is some mild oddness in the fact that the more powerful PKR cabinet portfolios seem to have gone to Azmin Ali and his supporters.

There are probably many within PKR who retain Reformasi 1.0 sentiments, and a distrust of Mahathir.

Bersatu supporters like Daim Zainnudin or A Kadir Jasin may harbour similar feelings - towards Anwar.

To cut a long story short, in looking for some leverage to ensure that Mahathir makes good on his promise, one of the most numerically logical places for Anwar to turn to would of course be Umno.

If all Umno parliamentarians work as a bloc, their potential to trigger a change in government cannot be ignored.

In Anwar’s worst case scenario, should Mahathir renege on his promise, Anwar could use Umno as his trump card, and simply tell Bersatu that he does not need them to become prime minister.

Of course, as long as Mahathir remains the PM, he has a very poweful trump card of his own - calling early elections, in which case all bets will be off.

NATHANIEL TAN wrote two previous drafts of this article before deciding on this piece for Part I.

Tomorrow: In Part II, the author focuses on Umno.

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