It's very clear that Perikatan Nasional is an unstable coalition. Actually, it's not even a formal coalition, as UMNO leaders have taken pains to point out. We don't know exactly how many MPs Muhyiddin has with him but a good working theory is 113, which is political analyst Wong Chin Huat's assumption. To control Parliament, you need 112. So, Muhyiddin really has razor thin majority. All it takes is for two people to jump ship and your makeshift coalition crumbles.
Pakatan Harapan, which involved a marriage of convenience between PKR/DAP/Amanah with Bersatu, took nearly two years to fall apart. It's a safe bet it won't take anywhere that long for Perikatan to do the same. And the reason is simple: UMNO is not used to playing second fiddle and it will not stand for it in the medium term. In the short term, it was willing to be second banana because it was desperate to wrest power from Harapan. But already, you are seeing lots of cracks happening.
Muhyiddin has given positions to a lot of MPs in Perikatan but still there are some who have gotten nothing. And this is a problem, as Wong Chin Huat points out:
Perhaps Muhyiddin can appoint them to become heads of GLCs or something like that. But all it takes is for two of them to be disappointed and there goes your coalition!
But let's assume for the sake of discussion that he is able to mollify all. There would still be a problem when it comes to GE15. It's hard to imagine any consensus on seat allocation happening. This is a point well articulated by DAP MP Ong Kian Ming:
Pakatan Harapan, which involved a marriage of convenience between PKR/DAP/Amanah with Bersatu, took nearly two years to fall apart. It's a safe bet it won't take anywhere that long for Perikatan to do the same. And the reason is simple: UMNO is not used to playing second fiddle and it will not stand for it in the medium term. In the short term, it was willing to be second banana because it was desperate to wrest power from Harapan. But already, you are seeing lots of cracks happening.
Muhyiddin has given positions to a lot of MPs in Perikatan but still there are some who have gotten nothing. And this is a problem, as Wong Chin Huat points out:
When three out of five PN parliamentarians are either a minister, deputy minister, deputy speaker or menteri besar, how do you convince the remaining 45 that they are not losers?
Perhaps Muhyiddin can appoint them to become heads of GLCs or something like that. But all it takes is for two of them to be disappointed and there goes your coalition!
But let's assume for the sake of discussion that he is able to mollify all. There would still be a problem when it comes to GE15. It's hard to imagine any consensus on seat allocation happening. This is a point well articulated by DAP MP Ong Kian Ming:
UMNO and PAS will have their hands full in allocating the 100 parliamentary seats in Peninsular Malaysia, where both parties contested in GE14, under a Muafakat Nasional (MN) formula for GE15. Umno, PAS and Bersatu competed in 47 Parliament seats in Peninsular Malaysia in GE14.
