This article first appeared in Forum, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on September 18, 2023 - September 24, 2023

The steady fall of Umno-led Barisan Nasional (BN) from power, stretching from 2008 to 2018, and its ability to remain in government thereafter in one role or another tells an incredible tale that could not have been predicted and that still leaves most pundits confounded.

Some of the implications of Umno’s recent losses are as revelatory of the past as they are of the future. Concretely, what is unveiled in the process is a geopolitical picture that history has painted for us over the last few hundred years, and with very deep and broad brushstrokes.

About 150 years after the British gained their first settlement on the Malay peninsula, thus extending their influence beyond the Indian Ocean and eastwards towards China, they decided it was time to retreat and sail home. Over that period, the sociopolitical and socioeconomic imprint they put over the peninsula and the whole northern coast of Borneo — basically the coasts bordering the South China Sea — varied greatly from part to part, and from state to state.

From acquiring ports — Penang, Melaka and Singapore — they moved on, albeit slowly at first, to controlling tin mines and plantations in Perak, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang, to developing a hinterland for Singapore in Johor, to a buffer zone in the north, that is, Kedah, Perlis, Kelantan and Terengganu. Other dynamics decided their colonisation of Sarawak and Sabah.

Summarily, the Colonial Office in London ended up with the Straits Settlements of Singapore, Penang and Melaka (completed by 1826), the Federated Malay States of Perak, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang (1874-1896), and the Unfederated Malay States of Kedah, Perlis, Kelantan and Terengganu (1909). Johor became an Unfederated Malay State only in 1914, and under duress, and was different in all important ways from the northern states bordering Siam.

As buffer zones, the northern Unfederated Malay States were in effect protectorates more than colonies. And when the Japanese conquered Southeast Asia in 1942, these states were actually handed back to the Kingdom of Siam to control.

Needless to say, the colonial histories of Sarawak and Sabah differed even more profoundly from the territories on the peninsula.

Whichever the case, the deep differences in administrative, economic and strategic experiences throughout this period of the people who came to inhabit these diverse colonial and semi-colonial entities naturally equipped them differently for how they were to survive in a post-colonial world.

In fact, given the complexity of Malayan social anthropology, one should be astounded at how peacefully Malaysia as a nation has remained so far.

To give credit where it is due, the willingness of its various communities to live together and get along with each other is a major factor for this achievement. That is the first important point to consider. This wish to get along is always under challenge, sometimes more strongly than at other times. That is only to be expected. Politics is as much about finding fault and putting blame as it is about seeking progress and harmony.

Secondly, the consociational system has largely been successful in keeping political differences from turning to violence. Tensions within this system are indubitably unending, but the system chugs along.

Thirdly, there had been enough insightful leadership in the early years for a strong sense of common purpose to be embedded in the population. Again, this is always under threat.

Fourthly, Southeast Asia has been a peaceful region where notions of neutrality are not naive and are in fact visionary policy thinking. Threats to that come more from the wishes of global powers rather than from countries in the region.

Fifthly, the federalist system that Malaysia was wisely born with continues to promise local autonomy for the 13 states within the project of national integration. However, this promise had been ringing hollow for a long time now. In fact, one could see the rise of an opposition since 1998 as a struggle by Malaysian states to reinstate not only better governance but also to realise the autonomy promised since 1957 and 1963 by the federalist ideology.

To sum up, the throwing off of Umno’s dominance over the politics of the Federation of Malaysia 60 or so years after the Federation of Malaya gained independence, released and revealed the tension that it had managed and steered — no doubt for its own ends — between the nation-building need for policy centralisation and sociocultural standardisation on the one hand, and the reality and depth of Malaysian sociopolitical diversity on the other.

What we have today are state elections becoming more and more important, the Malay constituency seeking representation through more and more separate channels, the minorities feeling marginalised and therefore concentrating their votes to the DAP and the Pakatan Harapan coalition, and Sabah and Sarawak looking for material recognition of equal status to the Federation of Malaya.

All this calls for another solution and balance to the Malaysian dilemma of “diversity seeking unity”.

Interestingly, what has emerged is a “unity government” that is understandably wobbly on its feet, and uncertain of its policies. But it is in search of that new balance. Just as interesting is the fact that opposition to it is strongly based in what were once the Unfederated Malay States, excepting Johor.

The “unity” of the federation is not yet complete. And finding out why should be our next task.

Datuk Dr Ooi Kee Beng is the executive director of Penang Institute, and director of its Forum for Leadership and Governance Programme. His latest book (due next month) is Signals in the Noise (Singapore: Faction Press, 2023), a compilation of writings from 2018 to 2023). Homepage: wikibeng.

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