(Sept 24): Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin, the long-time political operator who helped two Malaysian prime ministers to power, could again have a hand in shaping who governs as he pushes the nation’s two biggest parties towards an alliance.

Since launching Parti Wawasan Negara in June, Hamzah has become the official parliamentary opposition leader thanks to the backing of the largest rival group Parti Islam Se-Malaysia, or PAS. His self-professed goal is to push PAS into a national alliance with the United Malays National Organisation, consolidating the two chief parties representing Muslim Malays, who make up almost 60% of the population.

If realised, such a pact could undermine Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s coalition government, which has counted Umno as a partner since an inconclusive 2022 election. It would also create a formidable political alliance going into the next polls, which must be held by early 2028.

“What I’m trying to pump into their heads is: ‘Hey you’re Malays, sit down’,” Hamzah said in a Sept 17 interview at his office in Bukit Tunku, a leafy and affluent enclave in the capital, Kuala Lumpur. “In this country the Malays are the majority and if the Malays are not united, how could a country be stable?”

Umno and PAS successfully cooperated in the August state election in Negeri Sembilan, where they agreed not to field candidates against each other and ended up ousting Anwar’s Pakatan Harapan from the state government. They’re now considering a similar arrangement in Malacca, where another state election is due within the next two months. 

While Hamzah said he played a role in bringing Umno and PAS together, he downplays their need for him now as an intermediary. Leaders of both groups have attended each other’s recent party gatherings, with both sides publicly expressing interest in extending their cooperation nationally.

That’s upset Anwar, with people familiar with the matter saying his relationship with Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi has deteriorated. Zahid, who leads Umno, wants national elections to be held “as soon as possible” in a sign Umno wants out of its pact with Anwar’s Pakatan Harapan. 

Malaysia’s complex political system aims to ensure representation along with economic and other privileges for Muslim Malays, who have accounted for all the country’s prime ministers since independence in 1957. At the same time, governing coalitions traditionally provide a voice for the country’s ethnic Chinese, Indians and other minorities.

Hamzah, who began his political career with Umno and whose Parti Wawasan Negara party is now allied with PAS, remains well-positioned to help bridge divisions between the two parties that have spent years competing for the same Muslim Malay voters. 

The 69-year-old played a key role in gathering the parliamentary support that propelled Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to the premiership in 2020, including winning the backing of Umno and PAS. That brought down the government of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who acknowledged Hamzah’s role in getting the two big Malay parties to cooperate. The newly installed prime minister Muhyiddin then named Hamzah secretary general of his Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia, or Bersatu.

When Muhyiddin lost his parliamentary majority just a year later, Hamzah then helped rally support for Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob to become the next prime minister.

A fresh, national electoral pact formed by the main Malay parties remains possible, according to Syaza Farhana Mohamad Shukri, an associate professor of political science at the International Islamic University Malaysia. But the Muhyiddin administration was beset by infighting, and Umno’s Malay nationalism has long put it at odds with PAS’s more explicitly Islamist vision of government.

“Political Malay unity is difficult because every party is looking out for itself,” Syaza said.

Hamzah was expelled from Muhyiddin’s Bersatu in February following a protracted power struggle. 

He says his barely three-month-old Wawasan party has attracted more than 50,000 members, and forecasts those numbers could reach 300,000 by the end of the year. By comparison, Umno has about 3.5 million members, while Anwar’s People’s Justice Party claims about one million.

Wawasan made its electoral debut less than a month after its formal registration, winning three assembly seats in the state of Negeri Sembilan. Hamzah confirmed the party will also contest the Malacca election. Unlike other Malay parties, it allows other ethnicities to be ordinary members and hold leadership positions, while reserving the presidency for Malays.

“I’m not new in this game,” Hamzah said. “I was actually a businessman before I really turned to politics.”

Hamzah won his parliamentary seat in 2008 under Umno, but quit the party after the 1MDB scandal led to Umno’s first-ever national defeat in 2018. He joined Bersatu, having been convinced to remain in politics by the late tycoon and former finance minister Tun Daim Zainuddin, who had helped draw Hamzah into politics in the early 2000s. 

He views PAS president Tan Sri Abdul Hadi Awang, an Islamic scholar, as a “guru” and their relationship led to the Islamist party announcing in June that Hamzah would return as opposition leader, with PAS leader Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar remaining chairman of the Perikatan Nasional opposition bloc.

Hamzah is the “only one that can talk to both Zahid and Hadi”, Syaza said. “I wouldn’t even be surprised if he becomes the PM candidate.”

Hamzah dismissed any suggestion he’s positioning himself to become premier, saying larger parties have potential candidates like PAS’s Samsuri and Umno’s Zahid. 

“I will help anyone who aspires to be the prime minister,” Hamzah said, arguing he can help assemble the people and alliances required to govern. “You have heard people describe me as an operator.”

But the one alliance Hamzah does rule out is with Anwar.

“I’m an opposition leader and Anwar is the prime minister,” he said. “He doesn’t want me and I do not want him.”

Uploaded by Chng Shear Lane