The opposition Pakatan Rakyat in the twelfth Malaysian parliament, 2008–12, and parliamentary behaviour on the budget process

In the post-2008 Malaysian general election, the opposition political parties the Parti KeADILan Rakyat, the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party and the Democratic Action Party started to gain currency, especially when the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) government was denied its two-thirds of the majority in parliament. The 2008 result indicated that there was a substantial shift in support from the incumbent BN to the opposition parties. The opposition later on was formed into a coalition known as Pakatan Rakyat (PR). The minor victory of the PR in the 2008 election suggested that it had secured a considerable number of seats in the twelfth Malaysian parliament. This article argues that the 2008 electoral outcome exhibited substantial competitive parliamentary behaviour despite the authoritarian nature of Malaysia. The article examines PR behaviour in the twelfth parliament with reference to the budget process. Besides elections, the Malaysian parliament is a very crucial indicator of the development of democratic governance in Malaysia. This article argues that the opposition PR is still relevant in the way in which it has fully exercised its legal parliamentary capability, especially its de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim, in questioning and posing constraints on the ruling BN policies concerning the budget process.     

So Close and Yet So Far: Strategies in the 13th Malaysian Elections

Abstract

This article examines the strategies employed by the ruling coalition, Barisan Nasional (or National Front), and the opposition alliance, Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Alliance), in the 13th general election held in Malaysia in May 2013. It argues that while the opposition used the right strategy for the 2013 campaign, it lost because it could not overcome the three biggest hurdles for opposition politics in Malaysia: East Malaysia, the rural Malay votes and a biased electoral system.     

Politically Engaged Muslims in Malaysia in the Era of Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (2003–2009)

Long regarded as an embodiment of tolerant Islam and peacefully co-existing with modernisation within a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society, Malaysia unexpectedly aroused much attention as a potential breeding ground for Muslim radicals in the aftermath of catalytic events which pitted the West against the Muslim world. Malaysian Muslims are said to be susceptible to Middle Eastern-originated radicalism, as exemplified in interlocking transnational contacts and agendas sowed between increasingly globalised Muslim networks adept in exploiting latest trappings of modernity. This article urges readers to engage in deeper reflection on the local dynamics of Malaysia's Islamisation process, in order to arrive at a more nuanced understanding of challenges posed by politically engaged Muslims in Malaysia. It is argued that, belying the regime's profession of a progressive Islam known as Islam Hadhari, Malaysia under Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's Premiership witnessed an abrupt escalation of inter-religious tension which not only threatened to disrupt communal harmony and nation-building, but also posed a security risk. The origins of such instability could arguably be located to the peculiar manner in which politically-laden Islam is applied by the regime, in particular by its home-nurtured Islamic bureaucracy.     

Women,writing and politics in Sonallah Ibrahim's That Smell and Notes from Prison

In That Smell and Notes from Prison, Sonallah Ibrahim engages literary and feminist discourses in his political narrative against the Nasserist regime and the culture of commitment (iltizam) of the 1960s. Ibrahim's antihero is a newly released writer who is faced with the challenges of overcoming his failure to connect with women and society, and find a motivation to write. He realizes that most readers, writers and critics are not in favour of his literature of exposé, which refuses to depict or treat the ugly reality as a beautiful one. In foreshadowing the 1967 defeat and the impotence of Arabs, That Smell and Notes from Prison warns of a prolonged cultural and literary decay should political corruption override basic human and women's rights in the Arab world.     

Books Received

ABSTRACT

In the summer of 1934 Eastern Thrace was shaken by a wave of antisemitic violence that ended as suddenly as it had begun. The reasons underlying this attack on the Jewish minority are still not well understood, mainly due to the lack of definitive Turkish sources. New evidence indicates that ?brahim Tali, the representative of the Turkish government in Thrace and the district of Çanakkale further south, played a crucial role. The incidents should be understood in light of Turkish–Italian tensions in the spring of 1934, and the strategic need for re-arming the demilitarized zones in Thrace and at the Straits.     

A critical understanding of good governance and leadership concepts written in the context of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) and the challenges to contextual discourse on Africa's development paradigms1

ABSTRACT

Good governance is a value-laden concept that is characteristically nebulous; it can mean different things to different people, depending on the context in which it is used. The same applies to leadership. Concepts, as Pauw (1999a, 465) puts it, are ‘tools of thinking’ and contexts are ‘the environments or frameworks in which they [concepts] operate’. Lucidity in the meanings of concepts is fundamentally important for shaping debate and enriching discourses. To maintain their power, concepts must be used in their proper contexts. This necessitates an understanding of the art of contextual discourse. Good governance is used in NEPAD as a principle and emphasised as a sine qua non for sustainable development in Africa. On the other hand, NEPAD premises Africa's re-birth or Renaissance on good governance and leadership, with a vision and commitment to repositioning the continent in global power balances. In this article good governance and leadership are considered as concepts. NEPAD is a textual context within which the two key concepts are used and should, consequently, be engaged. The article attempts a critical review of African scholarship engagement with good governance and leadership within the NEPAD context to determine the extent to which contextual discourse is practised. It further grapples with the immediate historical background to scholarship on Africa's development between the 1960s and early 1990s. The exercise reveals that much of the accumulated body of African scholarship and scholarship on Africa's development reviewed does not suffciently contextualise discourse on good governance and leadership within NEPAD, and its key assessment and monitoring device, the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), and offers an alternative framework.