Malaysia's Moment of Sanity

• Main Author: WELSH, Bridget
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2012
• Subjects: Malaysia; politics and government; Anwar Ibrahim; Asian Studies; Political Science
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/1292
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Yesterday's acquittal of Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on the charge of sodomy ends two and a half years of a bad sequel. After being convicted once in 2000 on the same charge and subsequently exonerated on appeal, this time the court found that the prosecution failed to prove its case. The decision is a moment of sanity after three years of political turmoil since the March 2008 polls. That election effectively broke the stranglehold on power of the incumbent Barisan Nasional, the National Front coalition, which lost its two-thirds majority in parliament. After the loss, the ruling United Malays National Organization seemed to go back to its mode of personal-attack politics, as practiced by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. The new accusation against Mr. Anwar also signaled a return to the ways of the Mahathir era.