The seeds of discontent (Part 3)

Somebody's clearly not happy!

"It is clear that UMNO, as the biggest bloc of MPs, has been sidelined in an unfair manner that can be seen in two matters," says UMNO Deputy President Mohamad Hasan. The two matters are UMNO being assigned to non-critical ministries, and Bersatu (including Azmin Ali's camp) taking the lion's share of portfolios.

"Coalition government should be based on propotionate representations and not dominated by any one party, and to make it more legitimate it must have written agreement between political parties involved," says Azalina Othman, adding that "UMNO sepatutnya layak diberikan Kementerian yang lebih significant seperti Kementerian Wanita, KDN, Kementerian Luar Bandar, MOF dan MOA".

Muhyiddin's cabinet does not reflect PN's en bloc spirit - Sharir

Umno tak selesa Azmin jadi menteri kanan - Tajuddin

Snap polls are the best for everyone

When May 18 comes around, there are four possible scenarios:
i) Vote of no confidence fails and Perikatan Nasional continues to be the government of the day
ii) Vote of no confidence succeeds with Pakatan Harapan having the majority. Muhyiddin asks for Parliament to be dissolved and King agrees. Snap polls ensue.
iii) Vote of no confidence succeeds with PH having the majority but King declines to dissolve the Parliament. PH is recognized as the government.
iv) Vote of no confidence succeeds but PH doesn't have the majority either (neither coalition does). Parliament is dissolved and snap polls ensue.

Are there any other potential scenarios than the ones listed above? I can't think of it. So, let's just say those are the only four possible outcomes.

Scenario 1: PN succeeds
At the time of writing, it looks like this is the most likely scenario with Muhyiddin having around 113 seats. It's very tight but it looks like he has the majority (for now).

Scenario 2: PH succeeds but snap polls ensue
In the event that PH succeeds with its vote of no confidence and actually has a majority, snap polls are likely to happen because Muhyiddin will surely ask for that in such a scenario. The King has the discretion to say no but usually the King acts on the advice of the PM.

Scenario 3: PH succeeds and is recognized as the government
Even if PH has the numbers, snap polls are more likely than PH being recognized as the government. If they have the majority, it would be a very slim one, maybe by a margin of one or two. That makes for a very unstable government as there will be a lot of party hopping happening. We can't have a situation where there are regular votes of no confidence happening and governments changing hands all the time. This is the least likely scenario.

Scenario 4: Vote of no confidence succeeds but nobody has the majority
At the time of writing, this is more likely to happen than scenario 2 or 3 as PH is unlikely to get a majority. But there could be enough discontented MPs in Perikatan (those who didn't get to become ministers or deputy ministers) that they could abandon PN without supporting PH. In this scenario, it's snap polls too.

So, out of the four scenarios, the most likely (at the time of writing) is 1 (PN stays in power). Second likely scenario is 4: (Nobody has the majority and snap polls are called). Third would be 2 (PH gets majority but snap polls are called). Least likely is 4 (PH gets majority and forms the government).

If you look at the Top 3 likely scenarios, they all involve elections. Scenario 1 may mean polls two to three years later. Scenario 4 and 2 means snap polls.

Whatever the case, I maintain that PH has the edge in any election. In the case of snap polls, PH has two things going for it. Firstly, seat allocations among its component parties have largely been sorted out. They just need to figure out who will contest where in Bersatu and Warisan seats. Yes, they must contest in all seats so they can get a majority without the need for outside help. It will be impossible for PN to sort out seat allocations so fast. The second thing PH has got going for them is that while PH can go for the Malaysian vote (Malay and non-Malays), PN can realistically only go after the Malay vote. And the Malay vote will still be split.

What about a general election two or three years down the road. It will actually be even worse for PN. Firstly, no amount of time will allow them to properly sort out seat allocations because Bersatu, UMNO and PAS are each going after the same vote. And none of the parties will give way to the other because they each obviously want to increase their numbers in Parliament. Secondly, even in cases where there is an agreement there is bound to be sabotage by disgruntled politicians who felt that constituency should have been given to him. Thirdly, after two years of PN rule, the rakyat will really want to throw them out.

So, actually the best scenario for PN is snap polls because if they somehow manage to win that, they will have another five years. Otherwise they are at most a two or three year government. Interestingly, the best scenario for PH is also snap polls because they are likely to win it.

So, snap polls are actually the best.

The seeds of discontent (Part 2)

I am disappointed in you. That's right, YOU!

First you had Parti Kerjasama Anak Negeri expressing disappointment that Sabah STAR president Datuk Dr Jeffrey Kitingan was not appointed a full minister.

Then, you had Bintulu MP Tiong King Sing rejecting the post of deputy national unity minister because he should be a full minister instead.

Now you have Azalina Othman saying: "Umno should have been given more significant ministries..."

You also have Cameron Highlands MP Ramli Mohd Nor lamenting: "It seems that the PN government has sidelined the voice of the Orang Asli in the peninsular."

It seems like Muhyiddin will have to appoint at least 112 ministers and deputy ministers to keep everyone in Perikatan happy. Will we see a new record for the world's biggest Cabinet?

The seeds of discontent (Part 1)

And so it begins.

Sabah party disappointed Jeffrey not made full minister

and...

Tiong rejects deputy minister post

Dr M's second miscalcuation

Dr M's first miscalculation was in assuming that Pakatan Harapan was so desperate to have him as PM that they would support him even as he rebuffs the PH government as a concept.

When he abruptly resigned as PM and as chairman of Bersatu, he enjoyed the support of practically every party and faction in Parliament. That probably gave him a false sense of security, so much so that when PH invited him to attend a meeting to discuss how to revive the PH government, he declined.

Instead, Dr M told them he wanted a Unity Government where he could pick and choose whomever he wanted. It would be an unprecedented system (in the Malaysian context) whereby he would be accountable to no one but everyone in the government would be beholden to him.

The Opposition balked at this and not surprisingly, so did PH. So instead, they nominated Anwar to be their PM should they be able to garner at least 112 MPs. It was only when Muhyiddin decided he, himself, would be the PM candidate that PH and Dr M hastily collaborated once again to try to thwart him. But by then it was too late.

Overplaying his hand and assuming PH would support him no matter what was miscalculation No 1. Miscalculation No 2 happened almost immediately after that. Amazingly, it was the exact same mistake!

The King had decided to recognize Muhyiddin as the one who is most likely to command the confidence of the majority of the MPs, so he was named the PM.The King then refused to see Dr M who claimed to have a list of 114 MPs who supported him as PM.

In response, Dr M embarked on a roadshow to explain the situation to the Bersatu grassroots. Remarkably, he decided to badmouth PH in general and Anwar in particular, blaming them for abandoning him.

What he conveniently neglects to mention was that PH actually supported him to be the PM. It was only when he refused to be the head of PH (and wanted his own Unity Government instead) that they decided not to support him anymore. They didn't abandon him. He was the one who abandoned PH.

Now, why on earth would he go around badmouthing Anwar when he clearly needs PH? His faction of Bersatu consist of maybe five MPs. With Warisan supporting him, that's another nine. So he has perhaps 14 MPs on his side. PH has 92.

In terms of numbers alone, he clearly needs PH more than PH needs him. But the problem is that all the while, over the past 22 months, the other PH parties kowtowed to him and he's gotten used to that.

This is probably why he thinks he can get away with badmouthing Anwar and still enjoy their support. He thinks PH wants to overthrow Muhyiddin so badly, they will do so at all cost, including having him as their PM candidate again, even as he badmouths their leader.

Well, it looks like PH has finally realized the folly of their appeasement ways. Wan Azizah has said that PH will likely go with Anwar as their PM candidate for any future PH 2.0 government.

This is the right move. If Dr M wants to lead PH again but only on his terms (no naming of Anwar as DPM, no transition date, etc), what's the point? The 14 seats that he can bring to the table is not worth having to put up with such nonsense.

Even if it means PH will be staying in the Opposition for some time, so be it. PH should use the opportunity to rebrand and rebuild itself ahead of GE15 rather than try to engineer some crossovers.

If they don't have the numbers, they should work towards winning the next election instead. They shouldn't waste time looking for defectors.

If you take in frogs, you run the risk of them jumping ship once someone dangles a better offer. You can't build a sustainable coalition on frogs.

Instead, PH should aim to win the right to form the government the old fashioned way: Winning an election convincingly.

Muhyiddin may have the majority after all

Political scientist Wong Chin Huat figures Muhyiddin might be able to garner a total of 113 seats based on the following numbers:

BN: 42
Muhyiddin's Bersatu: 32
GPS:18
PAS: 18
Sabah Parties (PBS 1, PBRS 1, STAR 1): 3

This gives him 113 (112 is needed for the majority).

The key to his majority is the Sabah parties. Without them, he would have only 110. But he gave the Sabah parties one ministerial and two deputy ministerial positions. And voila, he has 113.

Smart move and maybe this is enough to checkmate Dr M & Pakatan Harapan, which had previously claimed to have 114, then 112. Now, it looks like they have only 107.

Of course PH has until May 18 to turn things around and get that elusive 112 so they can take back the government. That's slightly more than two months away. Two months can be an eternity in politics where allegiances can switch overnight, but right now it seems like Muhyiddin's done what he needed to do to secure himself the majority.

That said, it's not going to be smooth sailing for Muhyiddin, whom Chin Huat calls "the weakest of all prime ministers" we've had so far. There's trouble brewing because as with the case when it was in PH, Bersatu has awarded itself the lion's share of ministerial and deputy ministerial positions.

To quote Chin Huat: "Despite being the smaller party, Bersatu gets more executive jobs than its bigger partner, UMNO. Every 4 out of 5 MPs from Muhyiddin's Bersatu gets a job as minister or deputy minister, but only 2 in every 5 MPs in UMNO... every one from Azmin's camp - except Rashid who is already the deputy parliamentary speaker - gets an executive job."

And here's the money graph from Chin Huat: "How long will the losers in UMNO (also GPS, PAS and even Bersatu) tolerate this disproportional distribution of spoils?"

Chin Huat's got a good point. You see, when you're talking about a coalition whose member's primary motivation is to get Cabinet positions, the ones who got nothing (not even a deputy minister position) will not be satisfied. It will especially grate with UMNO and PAS MPs because of the disproportionate number of positions that Bersatu MPs got.

PH parties tolerated that kind of situation because, as I had mentioned in many blog postings, they decided to adopt a policy of appeasement (that's euphemism for kowtowing). 

They felt it's better to not rock the boat and instead to let Dr M have his way for two years. Then when Anwar takes over, he can change things. Or so they thought. Turns out Dr M was never going to let Anwar take over.

Hindsight's 20/20 but in retrospect, it's clear that appeasement was what did PH in. It emboldened Dr M, Muhyiddin and Azmin who saw the others as pushover. Give them an inch and they'll take a mile. 

UMNO and PAS will not make that same mistake. There is no chance of them adopting an appeasement/kowtowing policy. 

Zero.

One thing you can be sure of is that every single UMNO/BN and PAS MP is fully cognizant of the fact that together, they have almost double the number of MPs Muhyiddin has. 

That fact will never be lost on them and they will make demands of Muhyiddin accordingly. When he can't or won't give them what they want, that's when the trouble begins. 

As for PH, rather than try to engineer crossovers to get back the 112 they thought they had, perhaps it might be better for them to just lick their wounds and gear themselves up for GE15 about two years down the road.

PH needs to plan for a victory that gives them 112 seats without Dr M's Bersatu faction and without Warisan. It needs to win 112 seats on its own, without external help or else it will always be held to ransom by a small party that has enough MPs to give PH the majority.

Dr M might have only five or six MPs with him while PH has 92, but don't be surprised if he views Bersatu to be the dominant party in a PH 2.0 government.

He knows PH leaders are scaredy cats who were ghostly afraid of upsetting him lest he uses the nuclear option and blows up the whole coalition.

That tactic might not work anymore though.

In the past few days, he's been busy badmouthing Anwar for some reason. Why he thinks that is a good strategy when he badly needs PH's support, is anybody's guess.

This has not gone unnoticed and it has even provoked a response from Anwar, who probably has had enough of Dr M by now.

PH has got to realize they need to go their own way and try to secure a majority through elections rather than crossovers.

Dr M: Spin Doctor

First we heard Dr M's media czar Kadir Jasin saying the reason Dr M quit as PM and chairman of Harapan is that he didn't want to renege on his promise to let Anwar take over as PM.

Wow. Dr M was so committed to the transition that he was willing to resign over it. Sounds too good to be true. Turns out, it was too good to be true.

What Dr M really objected to was working with UMNO, not the fact that he had to renege on his pledge to pass the baton to Anwar.

You can't blame Kadir for trying to spin the story to make his boss look good. After all, that's what communication czars are paid to do. But it's the height of irony that Dr M is now trying to paint himself as not only the good guy but the victim in all this.

Let's look at the facts and see if he really is the good guy and whether he is the victim.

The Sheraton Move was not a spur-of-the-moment thing that came out of thin air. It's the culmination of months and months of scheming by Azmin and Muhyiddin. Although it's not clear whether Dr M was directly involved in cooking up this plan, what is clear is he certainly knew about it and condoned it.

Dr M is the type of guy who likes to keep people on their toes. He achieved that with Anwar by openly grooming his rival Azmin. That kept Anwar on the edge. He also achieved this with Pakatan Harapan in general by way of his mysterious meetings with Opposition leaders, the substance of which apparently none of the other component party leaders were privy to. That kept them all on the edge.

Although each component party is critical to maintaining the majority in Parliament, Dr M was the only one seen as potentially using the nuclear option to blow everything up if he does not get things his way. This had everyone in PH walking on eggshells.

But a nuclear option is only effective in keeping people in check if you don't use it. If you blow everything up, people have got nothing to lose already. Dr M fully understood that, so there was never any intention of using the nuclear option. He just liked having it as a threat to get everyone to toe the line.

Unfortunately for Dr M, Muhyiddin and Azmin jumped the gun and proceeded with the Sheraton Move right after Dr M got all the concessions he wanted from PH. Not only would there not be a transition date set, PH would leave it to Dr M to decide when he should leave.

Muhyiddin and Azmin were obviously looking for an excuse to do the Sheraton Move and when that excuse was not forthcoming, they decided to proceed with the plan anyway.

Dr M made a deft, unexpected move of his own by resigning as PM. This killed of the Sheraton Move. The aftermath of that was he had everybody supporting him to remain as the PM. It was stunning how universal that position was. Not only did all of PH plus Warisan want him to stay on as PM, so did the opposition. Yes, UMNO, PAS and GPS wanted him to be PM as well. At one point, he basically had the whole Parliament supporting him.

Dr. M could have used his considerable clout to help PH get back into power. But he didn't. Instead, he offered up a Unity Government concept that would give him the power to choose whomever he wanted for his cabinet. It would be a system where he was accountable to no one but everyone would be beholden to him.

What happened next took him completely by surprise. Not only did UMNO, PAS and gang withdrew their support, PH withdrew their support as well. Suddenly from having practically everybody's support, now he had practically none (save for his tiny faction in Bersatu and Warisan).

This is where Dr M plays the victim and says that PH suddenly had a change of heart and didn't want to support him any more. Actually, the one who had a change of heart was Dr M. What he had done was the exact opposite of what Kadir Jasin had claimed.

He didn't resign because he didn't want to renege on his promise to hand over the PM-ship to Anwar. He resigned precisely because he wanted to renege on that promise.

Once the PH government fell, he was free from the shackles of PH. Under his proposed Unity Government concept, there is no longer any commitment to hand things over to Anwar. That's exactly what he wanted. To be free of that promise but avoid looking like the bad guy.

In his roadshow briefings that he's been giving to Bersatu grassroots, Dr M talks about PH abandoning him. He conveniently leaves out the reason why they did so. They didn't change their minds on a whim. They dumped him when he made it clear he didn't want to head a PH government anymore.

So, who actually abandoned who?

Now that all of this has come out (everything you've read above has been published in reports by various media outlets), it will make it hard for PH and Dr M to work together. But work together they must in order to show that Muhyiddin doesn't have the majority in Parliament.

It is very plausible that PH + Dr M faction of Bersatu + Warisan + a few other individual MPs could make up a simple majority of 112. In contrast, it's hard to come up with a scenario where Muhyiddin has as many as 112. (His numbers appear to be around 108 or so).

We won't know for sure what the numbers are on either side until a vote of no confidence is called in Parliament but there's more than an even chance of PH succeeding.

If that comes to pass, Muhyiddin could ask the King for a dissolution of Parliament, which would then lead to snap polls. But the King could say no and instead recognize PH 2.0 as the government of the day.

If that were to happen, Dr M would presumably become the PM, heading a PH 2.0 government. Would things be a little bit different after all that has transpired? For example, would he make Anwar DPM and set a firm transition date?

It doesn't look like it. Media reports have emerged where he is said to have rejected the notion of Anwar as DPM. Will PH agree to that? One suspects they might just to get back into power again.

But PH would be pretty silly to allow Dr M with only five or six Bersatu members and and nine supporters from Warisan to call all the shots in PH 2.0. Yet, one suspects that's exactly what might happen.

You would think that the smart folks in DAP, PKR and Amanah would have learned their lesson and no longer trust a politician as Machiavellian as Dr M to do the honorable thing.  

They should no longer be afraid of his nuclear option. Rather, they should make him afraid of their nuclear option. After all, PH as a bloc has a whopping 92 seats in Parliament. Dr M + Warisan in contrast, has 15 perhaps? Even if the remaining five or so (that would make up a majority at 112) were to be on Dr M's side, that would make a grand total of 20.

That's 20 vs 92. PH deserves to be defeated if they allow a person with less than a quarter of what they have, boss them around. They tried the appeasement route the last time around and look where that got them.

If Dr M were to insist on having everything his way, including refusing to set a transition date, PH would be better off walking away from the deal and staying in the Opposition. The next few months would likely see Perikatan Nasional implode anyway and that could very well lead to snap polls, which PH could win.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, the Malay vote is still split despite Bersatu, UMNO and PAS coming together. So, PH should not be afraid of snap polls.

Pushing ahead as three parties might not get them what they want in the short term but in the long term it would allow them to build a stronger foundation for PH. They cannot afford to rely on marriages of convenience anymore, which was what their collaboration with Bersatu and Warisan was. If Dr M doesn't play ball, it's best to dump him.