Malaysia: health crisis intertwines with political crisis that has lasted for a year

Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin greeting people positive for Covid-19 around Kuala Lumpur.

AFP - SYARUL AZIS

Text by: Gabrielle Maréchaux Follow

6 min

February 24, 2020: Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad resigned in the midst of numerous parliamentary meetings aimed at bringing about a new legislative power.

Less than a month later, the country entered very strict containment to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

If this year this date coincides with the launch of the vaccination campaign, neither the health crisis, nor the political crisis are resolved today.

These two problems even seem to feed off each other and sometimes become one. 

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From our correspondent in Kuala Lumpur,

These are two news items that began by following one another on the Malaysian press, before intermingling, then becoming intrinsically linked by various cause and effect relationships.

On the one hand the coronavirus pandemic, on the other a parliamentary crisis of an unprecedented nature.   

Yet when Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad resigned on February 24, 2020, following a series of underwater maneuvers to change the parliamentary majority he led, the country only had 22 people who tested positive for the coronavirus, and still did not deplore any dead. 

This record, still not too worrying, did not change when on February 27, 2020,

the religious movement Tabligh Jamaat brought together

16,000 faithful

of 20 different Asian nationalities in a mosque in the suburbs of Kuala Lumpur.

No strict instructions yet prohibit mass gatherings and for good reason.

After the resignation of the Prime Minister, the country no longer has a Minister of Health and Malaysian elected officials are then actively engaged in seeking a new parliamentary majority that can appoint a new leader, according to the rules dictated by the Malaysian Constitution.

For the Constitution, the Prime Minister appointed by the King must represent the largest coalition of deputies. 

Muhyiddin Yassin, the "eternal number 2"

It will therefore be necessary to wait for the appointment of a new Prime Minister by the King on March 1, and the formation in the wake of a new government so that radical measures begin to be taken against the spread of Covid-19.

Thus, on March 16, 2020, a very strict confinement was declared but the wave of contamination of what is now called “ 

the Tabligh Cluster

 ” will remain out of control for a long time to come.

On May 19 again,

half of the coronavirus cases

detected in the country were linked to this event. 

If at the beginning of 2020 the health crisis could therefore have been, for many observers, aggravated by the highly unstable political context, the balance of power between these two news items will change rapidly.

Because when the king chooses Muhyiddin Yassin as head of government - after having heard twice behind closed doors all the Malaysian deputies - it is not necessary to wait long for the legitimacy of this man to be questioned.

The researcher at the Collège de France, Sophie Lemière, describes him as " 

an eternal number 2, an outsider who surprised everyone, the media, academics, politicians

 ".

To date, despite 25 motions of no confidence tabled in Parliament by various deputies, no vote has been able to consolidate the parliamentary legitimacy of the new Prime Minister. 

Reduced parliamentary activity

Because since the arrival of the Covid-19 in Malaysia, parliamentary activity has been reduced like a skin of grief.

Despite

suggestions

from some MPs to sit via teleconference, anti-Covid measures prevented Parliament from meeting for months.

When on May 18, 2020 the deputies can finally meet for the first time of the year, it is for one day only, when it is not possible to discuss other things than the management of the coronavirus. 

In the end, " 

Parliament must have sat for less than 30 days in 2020. And these are not even full days, when parliamentarians could usually stay until late at night,

 " recalls James Chin, a Malaysian researcher at the University of Tasmania.

There was no vote that could confirm the parliamentary base that supports the prime minister.

But despite this legislative power considerably reduced by the anti-Covid measures, the members of the opposition continue to demand publicly or through the press a new parliamentary majority and therefore the right to govern, like

Anwar Ibrahim

last October , as a second wave of coronavirus cases began. 

For Sophie Lemière, who is scrutinizing from Kuala Lumpur the countless new alliance games and reversals of jackets caused by this parliamentary crisis, the pandemic then served the Prime Minister as "a 

screen to put in place a whole bunch of measures that would allow him to not see its position questioned by the opposition and by voters

 ”.  

The government is playing the clock

Playing the watch is a key strategy for this, continues the researcher: “ 

Since the pandemic, social time seems to be suspended, Muhyiddin Yassin hopes to be able to also stop political time to contain another virus, that of political change.

He therefore made a first attempt to establish a state of emergency in October which did not work, because formally the state of emergency must be declared by the king.

In January he returned to see the king after several very clear attempts by the opposition to seize power.

His second attempt worked

 ”.

Now, with a state of emergency decreed until August, Parliament will once again have to wait to meet, vote on a motion of no confidence or call for new elections. 

The Prime Minister assured the national press that he was not carrying out

"a coup"

.

But for James Chin, by dint of wanting to stretch time, Muhyiddin Yassin is playing a dangerous game: " 

He used the pretext of the coronavirus to declare a state of emergency until August, if by then the health crisis and the economic crisis has not been resolved, which it seems unlikely when we listen to scientists, it will not be able to use a positive assessment to establish its legitimacy and the Covid-19 will no longer be able to serve as an alibi

 ”. 

On Twitter, Malaysian Internet users are celebrating “ 

a year of betrayal

 ”, with the hashtag 

#SetahunPengkhianatan

, already in the top spot for trends the day before February 24.

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