Anwar Ibrahim and Malaysia – the politics of hope and fear

EVERYONE seems obsessed with the same political parlour game.

Will UMNO leave the Unity Government? Will BN pull out? Will the Government fall?

Really?

Perhaps we should spend a little less time discussing who is going to pull whose chair away and a little more time asking what Malaysia intends to do with an extraordinary window of opportunity.

The Unity Government was created after an inconclusive election for one overriding reason: stability.

Malaysia needed breathing room.

We needed to rebuild confidence in a country whose international name had become almost inseparable from 1MDB, political instability and kleptocracy.

Whatever your politics, something important has happened since.

Malaysia is back on the international radar for the right reasons.

In 2025, we recorded RM426.7 billion in approved investments — the highest in our history. Foreign investment rose more than 20%. Nearly 245,000 jobs are expected from those approved projects.

That didn’t happen because somebody gave a good speech.

Confidence returned.

But now comes the harder part.

We have attracted the capital. Now we must bring the opportunity to the ground.

And this is where global chaos may become Malaysia’s great opportunity.

America is increasingly unpredictable on trade. Tariffs have disrupted assumptions built over decades. Wars and geopolitical tensions are reshaping supply chains. European and American companies face higher costs and slower growth in their traditional markets.

Thousands of their SMEs need Asia.

They need ASEAN.

They need manufacturing, distribution, talent, technology and access to the enormous markets of Southeast Asia, China and India.

Why shouldn’t Malaysia become their home in Asia?

This should now become a national obsession.

Create the incentives. Cut the bureaucracy. Build the platforms. Find these companies rather than waiting for them to find us.

Bring 1,000 of them. Then another 1,000.

Because these aren’t small companies by Malaysian standards. Many European and American SMEs would resemble respectable medium-sized Malaysian listed companies.

And unlike another giant investment announcement, thousands of such businesses spread opportunity through the real economy.

They need accountants, engineers, lawyers, factories, logistics companies, software developers, designers, restaurants, homes and thousands of Malaysian employees.

That is how global investment becomes Malaysian prosperity.

And that is ultimately how we defeat the politics of race, religion and fear.

Not merely by shouting louder.

By making it irrelevant.

Give Malaysians opportunity, dignity, decent incomes and belief in tomorrow, and the political prostitutes who survive by convincing us to hate each other suddenly have much less to sell.

There will be noise.

There will always be peacocks strutting across the political stage, changing the colour of their feathers according to whichever audience happens to be watching. On all sides. Be they right-wing or the liberal elite. In many cases, the two are interchangeable depending again on the audience.

Let them strut.

Malaysia has bigger things to do.

And as for repeatedly threatening that one party or another will “bring down the Government” — governments in Malaysia are determined by parliamentary confidence, not newspaper headlines or WhatsApp rumours.

The question isn’t whether somebody can create another political drama.

We have become rather good at those.

The question is whether anyone is foolish enough to gamble Malaysia’s renewed credibility for another round of political musical chairs.

We have perhaps 12 to 15 months in which this Government should become absolutely ruthless about delivery.

Reform what needs reforming for the moment.

Fix what needs fixing for the now.

Bring investment down from the boardroom into the streets.

And deal decisively with those — including people within the broader establishment — who place personal ambition before national interest.

Leadership isn’t discovering where everybody is running and jumping in front of them.

Leadership is deciding where your people need to go — and having the iron will to take them there.

Sometimes persuading them.

Sometimes carrying them.

And occasionally dragging them kicking and screaming.

I believe we are approaching precisely that moment.

Anwar Ibrahim doesn’t need to own the geopolitical table.

Malaysia simply needs to hold the table.

A trusted, pragmatic, moderate meeting point between East and West; between China and India; between the Islamic world and the West; between developed economies looking for growth and ASEAN looking for capital, technology and markets.

That is Malaysia’s opportunity.

So let the political speculators speculate.

Let the merchants of fear sell their increasingly stale merchandise.

I've known this man for a very, very long time. Since I was 13 years old. And I've witnessed first-hand his evolution. He's made a lot of mistakes, as every single one of us has. He's also done a lot right. And only simplistic morons wouldn't recognise the sacrifices he and his wife made for this country.

But in politics, only action with results matters.

Some of these “merchants of fear” or political prostitutes, if you like, may soon discover that a rather cool breeze is blowing in their direction. I believe some may already be feeling the frostbite.

But I am not a politician. I  belong to no political party. So I may be completely wrong, but I don't think I am.

I am simply an ordinary Malaysian who believes deeply in this country, its people and what we can become.

We have spent far too many years discussing who will rule Malaysia.

It is time to concentrate on what Malaysia can rule.

The problem is we keep shooting ourselves in the foot. Constantly. At this stage, it takes a really special talent to keep doing it. We are gifted as a nation with everything. Our only luck is we have so far avoided shooting ourselves in the head.

Satu Bangsa Satu Negara

That was a line I created nearly 40 years ago when, as an 18 year old formed with a group of friends an organisation called Malaysiana Muda.

I believed then what I believe now. We are singularly plural.

We are Malaysia! - September 13, 2026

Datuk Dr Vinod Sekhar is the publisher of The Vibes and Chairman of the Petra Group.