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Opinion | Malaysia’s political pendulum has already swung back to Umno. Is Muhyiddin next?

  • The country has a new prime minister in Ismail Sabri, but its cabinet is mostly the same as Muhyiddin’s – signalling a return to conservative Malay politics
  • The former premier’s position heading the National Recovery Council is another sign of his survival instinct. Don’t discount another bid for the top job

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Muhyiddin Yassin delivers his last address as prime minister on August 16. Photo: DPA
From pandemic premier to pendulum politician, it’s as if Malaysia’s former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin never left.
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He survived numerous crises after being appointed to lead the nation in March last year, but barely two weeks after his resignation, Muhyiddin has made a comeback as the chairman of the country’s pandemic-related National Recovery Council (NRC). No matter which direction the government swings, it seems, it returns to where it has gone before.

Muhyiddin – who stepped down under repeated pressure from the king and Malaysia’s opposition, only to see successor Ismail Sabri Yaakob retain most of his cabinet – has successfully crafted for himself a historic and paternalistic role.

The NRC runs as a special committee in parallel to the cabinet and oversees the country’s management of Covid-19 as well as its recovery strategy. Muhyiddin’s position at its head is a new political coup that confirms both his influence and the return of the Malay-conservative formula built through the alliance of two coalitions: Perikatan Nasional, founded in 2020, and Barisan Nasional – led by the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) – which ruled uninterrupted for 61 years before the 2018 election.

Malaysians have been through another political crisis. Yet despite the expectation of a tectonic political shift that would see opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim finally becoming prime minister, the game has played out differently.
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