Malaysia: Muhyiddin’s razor-thin parliamentary majority in spotlight after MP found guilty of corruption

Tengku Adnan Mansor, a minister in the cabinet of disgraced former premier Najib Razak, has been found guilty of graft for taking a US$495,000 bribe

The verdict comes just days after the 2021 budget was narrowly passed, raising questions as to whether the government’s position will be further weakened

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Tengku Adnan Mansor during his stint as Malaysia’s tourism minister. Photo: AFP

Published: 3:14pm, 21 Dec 2020Updated: 1:40pm, 22 Dec 2020

Malaysian politician Tengku Adnan Mansor has been found guilty of graft, two weeks after a separate corruption trial involving the member of parliament was halted following a prosecutor’s call for a discharge not amounting to acquittal.

The Monday verdict came just days after Malaysia’s hotly debated 2021 budget was narrowly passed, raising questions as to whether Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s slim two-vote parliamentary majority will now be further weakened.

Tengku Adnan was on Monday sentenced to 12 months in prison and fined 2 million ringgit (US$495,000), with the judge allowing a stay of execution pending appeal.

Before sentencing, deputy public prosecutor Julia Ibrahim said a fine of “nothing less than 2 million ringgit” would be sufficient, pointing out that in March, during the early days of the trial, Tengku Adnan had described the amount as “just like my pocket money”.

The former top leader in the United Malays National Organisation (Umno) was in 2016 charged with receiving a bribe of 2 million ringgit from a businessman in his capacity as a public servant , two years before Umno was dethroned in the 2018 election.

While not officially part of the ruling Perikatan Nasional coalition, which took power earlier this year after an internal coup, Umno politicians make up part of Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s cabinet.

Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin attends a parliament session on the budget. Photo: DPA

Analyst James Chin of the University of Tasmania’s Asia Institute said that for now, the prime minister’s tenuous position as leader of the fractured Perikatan Nasional alliance was safe.