Opinion: There is no upside to replacing Anwar with Muhyiddin

Opinion: There is no upside to replacing Anwar with Muhyiddin


23 Mar 2025 • 4:00 PM MYT


TheRealNehruism
Writer. Seeker. Teacher

Image credit: Sinar Harian


Earlier today (20 March), out of nowhere, Perikatan Nasional chairman Muhyiddin Yassin came out with an odd statement to indicate that he is confident that the opposition coalition is much more capable of administering the country than the unity government.


“We (PN) can fix the situation. The people are currently going through a difficult time, whether it is no increase in income, the rising cost of goods or the lack of subsidies.


As a proof to his declaration, he will then cite the coalition’s achievement in managing the Covid-19 pandemic when it was in power.


According to Muhyiddin, even though there was no precedent on how to manage Covid-19, under his leadership, his administration had governed the country well and helped the country to survive the pandemic.


Despite the lack of a vaccine, Muhyiddin remarked, PN managed to resolve the various problems brought on by the pandemic, including reviving the country’s economy.


He also cited the roll out of the nationwide vaccination programme in February 2021 as a testament of his success.


According to Muhyiddin, if it were not for the initiatives that he initiated, “a large number of them ( meaning the people) would not have been able to carry on with their lives.”


In response to Muhyiddin’s claim , Umno Supreme Council member Puad Zarkashi would criticise Muhyiddin for touting his 17 months in the top office as a success, by declaring that Muhyiddin’s “half-baked” Covid-19 lockdowns failed to lower the pandemic’s death rate but heavily impacted the economy.


“The height of Muhyiddin’s failure was the white flag campaign across the country in 2021. Does Muhyiddin have a short-term memory problem?” Puad would say in his Facebook post to rest his case.


As we all know, the white flag campaign involved affected families who could no longer bear the brunt of the covid lockdowns, to hang a white flag or cloth in front of their homes to alert neighbours and good samaritans of the desperation of their situation.


It came at a time when many were struggling to put food on the table amid an indefinite lockdown that resulted in job losses and slashed incomes.


Arguably, it was the white flag campaign that caused public approval to so turn against the Muhyiddin administration, that the Muhyiddin administration was toppled not long after by an internal power struggle, which removed Muhyiddin and installed Ismail Sabri as the PM of the country.


Personally, I think that both Muhyiddin and Puad are right.


The reason their opinion is conflicting, in my opinion, is because they are describing different phases of Muhyiddin’s 17 month administration.


Muhyiddin is describing the beginning stages of his administration while Puad is describing its tail end.


The beginning stages of Muhyiddin administration occurred just weeks before the covid pandemic raged around the globe. At the time that it came about, people had almost given up at the inability of the Pakatan 1.0 government under Mahathir to provide a semblance of coherence or stability to the country, despite reigning for nearly 2 years.


The Pakatan 1.0 government was so new and unprepared for their role as the government, that none of them seemed to know what to do, once the responsibility of governing the nation was handed to them.


To make it worse, they were so engulfed with mistrust and suspicion towards each other, that even their own ministers from different coalition partners were frequently contradicting and attacking each other.


Considering the abject failure of the Pakatan 1.0 government to provide the nation with a semblance of a stable and functional government in its 22 months of reign, it was indeed a welcome relief to have Muhyiddin take the stewardship of the country at the onset of covid.


Muhyiddin was able to put together a functional and stable government, which the country direly needed to address the unprecedented global pandemic that was raging in the world.


The Muhyiddin administration, mind you, did not come out with any inventive or original initiatives to address the pandemic. On the whole, it merely followed the actions and procedures that were taken by other countries in the world or that were proscribed by such organisations as the WHO.


It is main achievement, by my reckoning, was that it was able to institute a stable and functional government to address the pandemic and displace the dysfunctional an incoherent Pakatan 1.0 government, which likely might not have been able to handle the unprecedented problem that that country was facing during the pandemic period.


However, in the later part of its administration, the Muhyiddin government was suspected, in my opinion, rightfully, of trying to exaggerate and prolong the pandemic phase in the country, simply to remain in power.


It would, for example, refuse to allow the parliament to convene, by citing safety concerns due to the pandemic, even at a time when people in the country had more or less returned to their normal routine.


At the peak of its estrangement with reality, the Muhyiddin government would even seek to institute “emergency rule” in the country, purportedly to handle the covid pandemic, when people had more or less returned to normal life, at a time when the effects of the pandemic appeared waning all around the globe.


That the Muhyiddin government seemed determined to prolong the shutdown of the country indefinitely, ostensibly to address the pandemic, would result in a segment of the population to raise a white flag outside of their house, to indicate the dire situation that they were in.


Many of those who had raised the white flag were so desperate that they had to be provided with food for the day by their neighbours and good Samaritans to continue living.


That the Muhyiddin administration was seen to cause the people to stoop so low as to “beg” for their livelihood, when it was widely seen that it was doing so not to address a legitimate healthcare concern, but merely to cling to power, was as Puad said, largely seen by Malaysians as a pinnacle of its failure.


Not long after the white flag movement laid bare the failures of the Muhyiddin administration, it was removed from power by an internal power struggle that received the consent of the people and the royalty.


Overall, I would rate Muhyiddin’s 17 month old government during the peak of the covid pandemic period as a “not bad, but not good” government.


It was not bad, because it did remove the dysfunctionality and instability that plagued the previous government enough to establish a functional and stable government that was able to follow international measures to address the pandemic.


It was also not bad in that it can be said to have successfully followed the international measures that were instituted by such organisations as WHO to address the pandemic.


For much of the pandemic, it also made us feel that we had a government we could turn to if we needed help.


It was not good however, because it tried to exploit the pandemic to pursue its own self interest, even to the point of causing the people a great amount of difficulty, in order to remain in power.


It was also not good because other than providing stability and functionality, it didn’t show any originality or ingenuity to address the novel problems that the pandemic caused. .


Considering that, I doubt that if Muhyiddin returns as the PM, he will be able to perform better than the Anwar.


Anwar, just like Muhyiddin, has been able to form a functional and stable government.


Muhyiddin however, has not shown any proof that he will be able to be more original or inventive than Anwar, to solve the ever rising new challenges that are occurring in the post-pandemic world.


At best, Muhyiddin will probably only be able to match the performance of the unity government.


Considering that even at best, it would be only able to match the stability and functionality that is already being provided by the current government, without showing that it has any capability or originality to address the challenges that the unity government is struggling to address, I don’t see why anyone should deem Muhyiddin as a superior alternative to Anwar.


If there is any reason why anyone in the country should be interested to see Muhyiddin replacing Anwar as the Prime Minister, it is solely for racial or religious reasons.


One might argue that Muhyiddin will serve the interest of the Malays and the Muslims as the Prime Minister better than Anwar, but other than this reason, there is really no upside to replacing Anwar with Muhyiddin.