Malaysia's Anwar Ibrahim says he has numbers to form government
Updated
Malaysia's Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim says he now has the numbers in parliament to topple the ruling coalition.
Presenter: Tom Fayle
Speaker: Professor Shamsul A B, of the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.
SHAMSUL: Well the talk in Kuala Lumpur is that he seems to have the numbers and that includes people even from the ruling party, but as usual in Kuala Lumpur talks like this we have to find out a little bit more and deeper, but if he does then he's in a position to actually move a vote of no confidence on the government and then perhaps takeover the government and alternative would be for the government to declare another election. So this is the possible scenario.
FAYLE: How many extra MPs does he need to be sure of a working majority?
SHAMSUL: Well he has now 80 seats and he needs about 40, around 40 seats to actually to have the majority because the parliament is 222 seats. So you need about that number, about 120 to really confidently have that dominance or rather that simple majority.
FAYLE: And where do you think that he's getting these potential defectors from?
SHAMSUL: The obvious area where there's a lot of dissatisfaction is in East Malaysia, in Sabah and also parts of Sarawak but I'm not surprised there will be a few in peninsular Malaysia too. But the majority's probably from the eastern Malaysian states.
FAYLE: And these are within UMNO or other members of the ruling coalition?
SHAMSUL: They are within UMNO in Sabah and they could also be within the ruling Barisan coalition and these are the numbers because anyway the opposition has already got the maximum numbers, what they need are actually people from the ruling party to cross over, so most people, most obvious possible candidates are from the ruling party.
FAYLE: Now Dr Anwar says he's in no hurry to get back into parliament despite the lifting of his formal ban. What do you make of that?
SHAMSUL: Well I think there are two things we have to watch carefully; number one is the talks and second is the reality. I mean politics like in most cases is a perception game so how you psyche up the whole opposition, where you are. But I think he will have to take his time for the simple reason that first he has to contest or become a senator because he's allowed in the Malaysian constitution for state governments, which he has now five of them to nominate him as a senator. And therefore he may not have to contest despite of his claims that he wants to contest. So this could be something that he doesn't tell the public but I think this is one option he has. Number two, he also has to work out quite clearly who wants to cross over and there has to be an official statement regarding this and they have to produce official letters. So these are steps that have to be taken carefully while controlling the public who are clearly supporting him in Kuala Lumpur to make sure that it doesn't go out of hand, because I think if there's any public discontentment openly that would cause riots and whatnot then his future would be gone too.
FAYLE: So he could avoid the necessity of having to force a member of his own party to stand down and force a by-election?
SHAMSUL: Well there have been cases in a commonwealth country where such opportunity arises a couple of times. So I think this is one area where nobody has actually seen a survey which I've done some homework about.
FAYLE: So there's no suggestion that he's having trouble getting anyone to fall on their sword in his favour so he can get into parliament?
SHAMSUL: No the question is not so much nobody would volunteer to resign for him, I think there would be a couple of them including his own wife who has publicly stated she's willing to stand down. But I think the most important part is when you have a by-election the politics is quite different from a general election because the government can concentrate all its forces and might into one particular area which is quite formidable if UMNO wants to take-up. The opposition may have a lot of support all over the country but I'm not quite sure in one area he would gain quite easily and I'm sure that if he wants to take-up that position it has to be in his wife's seat which she won with a big majority.
FAYLE: And briefly Professor Shamsul the Malaysian former prime minister Mahathir Mohammad has recently said that his successor Abdullah Badawi should step down immediately or they'll be a split in UMNO. Is that a real possibility?
SHAMSUL: Well that is a possibility but this is not a new possibility. Mahathir during his rule has his plan a and plan b, which is split UMNO in the middle, so I would imagine that is another possibility and it would happen by December we would know because I think there's a groundswell thinking about this possible option.
