Succession obsession gives Malaysia's UMNO heartburn
Succession obsession gives Malaysia's UMNO heartburn
By Simon Cameron-Moore
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters): Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's decision to fill the vacant finance minister post himself is at first glance hardly a sign Asia's longest serving leader plans to give up high office any time soon.
Next month Mahathir celebrates 20 years in charge, but the 75- year-old premier does not seem to be winding down.
Unable to find a ready-made successor to Daim Zainuddin, who quit last Friday after informing the prime minister privately two months ago he wanted to resign, Mahathir announced on Tuesday evening he would do the job himself for the time being.
Malaysians, members of Mahathir's own United Malays National Organization (UMNO), and foreign investors are waiting for the day when he calls it quits, some with dread, others with relief. Mahathir has said this is his last term, and that he will not serve after elections due in 2004, but there has been speculation he will step down beforehand.
No one is holding their breath after his decision not to give the second-most powerful job in Malaysia to anyone else just yet.
A senior UMNO Youth member said he doubted the premier intended to step down just yet.
"Is he leaving or isn't he? If he is, he really should have put everyone in place. If you ask me I think he's going to stay."
A Kuala Lumpur-based political analyst, who requested anonymity, agreed.
"Undeniably he's on the last leg. He can't go beyond 80, but I don't think he's going to step down.
"If he'd appointed an aspirant (to succeed him) or a politician not allied to him then it would have appeared that he was getting ready to go."
But political pundits have been foxed by the mercurial, sometimes emotional Mahathir's capacity to surprise before.
Meantime, Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, Mahathir's chosen a successor, can only wait.
And while UMNO's three vice-presidents -- Najib Tun Razak, Muhyiddin Yassin and Muhammad Muhammad Taib -- jockey for position, a dark horse is circling the ring.
Razaleigh Hamzah, a Malay royal who once split from UMNO after unsuccessfully challenging Mahathir in the late 1980s, has recently built bridges with the premier, making him one to watch, according to analysts and party insiders.
UMNO's general assembly, on June 21-24, will test the party's mood. Analysts say the last thing UMNO needs is in-fighting, with the Islamic opposition sucking away more Malay votes.
Supreme Council member Shahrir Samad, a frequent Mahathir critic, advised not to expect any fireworks in the form of confidence motions or pressure on the prime minister to appoint a full time finance minister.
"Believe you me, we don't operate that way. There will be some voices expressing issues close to the Malay community," Shahrir told Reuters.
He said the fixation with the succession issue was diverting UMNO's energies away from making it more acceptable to voters and the need to stamp out money politics in its ranks.
But the withdrawal of Mahathir's son, Mokhzani, from the business world in April, and Daim's unexplained resignation sparked some talk Mahathir's end-game had been set in train.
Mahathir has taken charge of finance before, after the sacking and jailing of his erstwhile deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, at the height of the Asian crisis in 1998.
At that time he controversially brought in capital controls and fixed the exchange rate at 3.8 ringgit to the dollar.
The policy seemed to work, protecting the banking system and generating export-led growth, so that Malaysia bounced back more strongly than most of its neighbors.
But now Mahathir is seen as wedded to the idea of exchange controls and the currency peg, and there are concerns that the prime minister may not recognize when policy changes are needed.
Whatever Daim's faults were, his counterbalance to a strong- minded premier on policy is now missing, analysts say.