Time to Change the Channel on Malaysia’s Soap Opera
Mahathir’s comeback in 2018 was dramatic and reset Malaysian politics. His next act needs to be merely pedestrian.
The smiles from the 2018 comeback are long gone.
Photographer: Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty
Mahathir Mohamad has been in public life longer than Malaysia has existed as a nation. His greatest service to the country was his return to leadership in 2018, with the stated intention of undoing the damage wrought by his successors in the decade-and-a-half since he’d left office.
The nonagenarian prime minister, who first came to power in the same year as Ronald Reagan, would now do well to declare victory and go home. All economies, governments and companies require renewal to prosper. A long period of political instability can only hamper Malaysia's response to the coronavirus as well as efforts to steer between its biggest trading partner, China, and largest source of foreign-direct investment, the U.S.
This approach has the added advantage of being what the prime minister pledged he would do all along. Mahathir said upon his resumption of power that he would serve only a fraction of the parliament's five-year term before handing over to rival-turned-ally Anwar Ibrahim. Given the approach of his 93rd birthday at the time, many observers took Mahathir at his word. Anwar said it was a two-year deal. That time runs out in May.