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Malaysian Federalism Needs a Clear Strategic Direction

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  The debate over the future of the United Kingdom offers Malaysia an important lesson: a union is not sustained merely by constitutional text, political slogans or the concentration of authority at the centre. It is sustained by the way power is shared, exercised and experienced by its constituent territories. In The Union and the State , Ciaran Martin examines the competing visions of the United Kingdom’s territorial future and identifies three broad approaches: multinational unionism, muscular unionism and pragmatic “muddling through”. His most important observation is that the future of a union may depend less on the formal transfer of powers than on statecraft: how the central government works with, competes with or intervenes in the affairs of constituent governments. This provides a useful framework for thinking about Malaysia’s federalism, particularly the evolving relationship between Putrajaya, Sabah and Sarawak. Malaysia is not the United Kingdom. The constitutio...
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Britain’s Union Crisis and Malaysia’s Federal Future

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  The coordinated call by political leaders in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland for constitutional change represents more than another episode in Britain’s long-running devolution debate.  Their Cardiff declaration signals a deeper question: can the United Kingdom continue to operate as a stable multinational union when political authority, national identity and constitutional expectations are increasingly diverging? The September 2026 pact is significant because the three territories are no longer approaching Westminster separately. Leaders associated with Plaid Cymru, the Scottish National Party and Sinn Féin have jointly argued that constitutional change should be facilitated and that the people of each jurisdiction should determine their own political future.  The Guardian reported that the summit was intended to demonstrate cooperation among the UK’s Celtic nations, although the political objectives and constitutional circumstances of Wales, Scotland and Northe...
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Najib’s Return Rewrites Malaysia’s GE16 Political Battlefield - Part 2

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  Najib Razak’s transition from prison to conditional house arrest has done more than revive the political afterlife of the 1MDB scandal. It has exposed a deeper structural imbalance within Malaysia’s unity government: Pakatan Harapan (PH) may possess the larger parliamentary bloc, but Barisan Nasional (BN), and particularly UMNO, retains political leverage far beyond its numbers. That imbalance is now visible in Anthony Loke’s decision to offer his resignation as Transport Minister following the conditional pardon granted to Najib. DAP’s Central Executive Committee decided that Loke would step down while the party’s other ministers remain in Cabinet to preserve political stability. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has yet to make a final decision on the resignation. The significance is not simply that one minister may leave. It is that DAP has been forced to demonstrate that participation in government does not mean surrendering its long-standing position on corruption and 1MDB. ...
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Najib’s House Arrest Could Reshape Malaysia’s Politics - Part 1

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  Najib Razak’s transition from prison to house arrest is not merely another chapter in Malaysia’s prolonged 1MDB saga. It has reopened a political fault line within the unity government and placed the relationship between Pakatan Harapan (PH), Barisan Nasional (BN) and particularly DAP under renewed pressure. More importantly, it raises questions about whether the political configuration that emerged after the 2022 general election can survive until GE16 in its present form. The Federal Territories Pardons Board has granted Najib a conditional pardon allowing him to serve the remainder of his SRC International sentence under house arrest until August 23, 2028, subject to a RM50 million fine and compliance with the imposed conditions. This does not erase his conviction, while his separate 15-year sentence in the 1MDB case remains subject to appeal. Nevertheless, the political consequences may be considerably larger than the legal mechanics of the decision. For Umno, Najib's return ...
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Cross-border cooperation needed to combat online scams: Malaysian expert

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KUALA LUMPUR, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Countries can work together to combat increasingly sophisticated online scams that have evolved into highly organized transnational criminal operations, a Malaysian expert has said. R. Paneir Selvam, principal consultant at Arunachala Research & Consultancy and a former lecturer at HELP University, told Xinhua in a recent interview that online fraud is no longer confined to a single country. It has evolved into "a highly organized transnational criminal enterprise that exploits differences in legal systems, technology and law enforcement capacity," said Selvam, who is also a researcher and writer. He said fraudsters are now capable of spoofing official telephone numbers, impersonating government agencies, and manipulating victims into believing they are facing criminal investigations, immigration violations or banking irregularities. "These are not isolated scams but components of an increasingly professional criminal ecosys...
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A Court Must Protect Those Without Capacity

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  The Melaka High Court has made an important and, in my view, entirely correct decision in refusing to immediately record a proposed RM1.7 million settlement involving a permanently disabled road accident victim. Judicial Commissioner K Raja Segaran’s decision is significant because it demonstrates that a court is not merely a passive institution for rubber-stamping agreements reached between litigants and their lawyers. According to Free Malaysia Today’s report, the accident victim, Sultan Nur Mohamad, suffered severe traumatic brain injuries and permanent disabilities following a motorcycle collision on March 2, 2024. He subsequently pursued his claim through his wife, Sharifah Nizamuddin, as his litigation representative. The Sessions Court had found the motorcycle rider wholly liable and the registered owner vicariously liable, awarding Sultan RM1.87 million in damages, interest and costs. While an appeal was pending, the parties agreed to settle for RM1.7 million, togethe...
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Houthis’ Rise Could Inspire Terror Beyond Yemen

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  The rapid rise of the Houthi movement in Yemen is no longer simply a Middle Eastern security problem. Its growing ability to combine territorial control, missiles, drones, maritime pressure and political messaging demonstrates how a non-state armed movement can transform itself into a strategic actor capable of challenging states and disrupting international commerce. For Southeast Asia, the more worrying question is not whether the Houthis will directly establish themselves in the region, but whether their success could inspire other terrorist organisations, extremist networks and sleeper cells to emulate their methods. Recent developments in Yemen underline the scale of the problem. The Houthis have claimed control of the strategically important port of Mocha and advanced towards the Bab al-Mandab Strait, one of the world's critical maritime chokepoints. Their advances have brought them closer to controlling territory overlooking the Red Sea shipping route. The renewed fi...
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