graphic by MZUKRI

IT MAY be disturbing to the uninitiated to witness the backstabbing, horse trading and voltefaces that were and are in abundance in the current political crisis besieging the nation.

However, what the initiated would find abhorring, if not ad nauseam, were and are attempts to ride the moral high horse, play victim and self-serving narratives without context.

The current crisis is obviously not a sudden phenomenon. It had been simmering, waiting to explode and when it did, it sent everyone reeling.

But what were the underlying factors? Firstly, from the very start, the Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition was never a marriage made in heaven. It was for political expediency and all the key players have a history with the other.

It came together with a single purpose — to rid the nation of a kleptocrat that was bleeding the country dry, and the party and coalition he belonged to did not have the moral courage to get rid of him on behalf of the nation.

PH managed to “slay the monster”, and then came the spoils of war. Minor squabbles erupted over these spoils, but they were well kept under the lid though every now and then, they threatened to spill over.

While the dissatisfaction spread over numerous issues, but central to all of them was that they begrudged the fact that they had to accept Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad (picture) as their prime minister (PM).

From Day 1 after the polls victory in May 2018, potshots were taken at Dr Mahathir, his Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia and his policies.

In the initial stages, these swipes were silenced because Dr Mahathir’s popularity was quite extensive, cutting across all sections of the society.

However, as the nation’s economy started to flounder, partly due to legacy issues and substantially from external trade wars, the popularity of PH and Dr Mahathir started waning. These opened windows of opportunities to anti-Mahathir personalities to ply their trade.

Fast forward, by the end of last year, the voices demanding Dr Mahathir to clearly state the date of his resignation grew louder.

Despite Dr Mahathir’s attempts to assuage them by stating that he was stepping down after APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) Summit in November, the demands did not slow down and in fact, those demands turned into threats of street demonstrations and protests.

There were no real attempts from the DAP and PKR leadership to rein in these utterances from their rans and even mid-level leaders so much so, it is not surprising that opinions — especially from Bersatu and pro-Dr Mahathir factions — concluded that they were put up or endorsed by their party leaders themselves.

While these were being crafted, the narratives accompanying them were that Dr Mahathir did not intend to honour the agreement to pass the baton to PKR president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

The collision course seemed inevitable and the acrimony was expected to peak during the PH presidential meeting last week, with PKR, backed by the DAP and Amanah, demanding Dr Mahathir to state the date of his resignation, knowing very well that it would undermine the PM.

While this is building up, Bersatu and other pro-Dr Mahathir factions decided to work on their own counter measures and started collecting statutory declarations (SDs) from MPs to state their support for Dr Mahathir as PM and that he be allowed to serve the full term.

By the time the PH presidential council was going to convene its meeting, it was already public secret that the (SDs) had way exceeded the 112-required simple majority. Anwar’s supporters tried to mount a “counter” SD campaign, but it probably floundered as nothing much was heard of it.

Nevertheless, the PH presidential council meeting ended quite “tame” with Anwar and his allies in PH sheepishly endorsing Dr Mahathir to continue as the PM without having to specifically state when he wanted to step down and given the freedom to decide when.

In other words, that took the wind out of the sail of the pro-Dr Mahathir factions. However, having embarked on the SDs exercise and knowing they had the numbers, they wanted to go for the “kill”, only to be stopped by Dr Mahathir himself who did not agree with it as it involved the setting up of a government with Umno which included several leaders who were on trial and awaiting trial.

Given that Umno wanted to join the new government en bloc, it meant that Umno would be the leading party in the new coalition which to Dr Mahathir meant literally handing over the government to the party he had worked to dislodge.

To him, while he was not averse to work and accept individual Umno MPs and leaders, it was unacceptable to have to work with the kleptocrats as a collective entity.

His refusal did not go down well with Bersatu, leading to him resigning as the chairman. He also resigned as the PM because to him, he had lost the support of his own party.

That put a stop to the new coalition taking over the government. Dr Mahathir was immediately hailed by the DAP and PKR as a man of principle, literally begging him to retract his resignation as the PM.

However, two days later, after Dr Mahathir proposed that a unity government is set up and those appointed to the Cabinet are chosen based on their ability and putting aside party lines, the DAP and PKR lashed out on it and accused Dr Mahathir of attempting to usurp power and be a dictator.

That immediately justified their stand to switch their support to Anwar as the PM. Now, accusations of Dr Mahathir being power crazy had re-emerged.

Not included in the narrative is that, if Dr Mahathir was crazy for power, he would have gone along with the original new government plan, and today, sitting pretty with a comfortable majority.

And his critics assume the moral high grounds — like men more sinned against than sinning.

Shamsul Akmar is the editor of The Malaysian Reserve.