Possible Outcomes Post-Permatang Pauh

 What are several possible outcomes of the Permatang Pauh by-election coming up on 26th August 2008 (the mother of all by elections)? Political pundits have been at it the whole week, at coffee shop tables and whatnot else.

  1. Anwar wins. Crossovers from BN to PR in sufficient numbers to take over Federal Government by the anticipated date of September 16th, also Malaysia Day. PR becomes the Federal Government in 25 days from now.
  2. Anwar wins. Crossovers from BN to PR in sufficient numbers to take over Federal Government by Sep 16th, but PR chooses to delay it till later, mainly for strategic reasons. Taking over so soon after Anwar re-enters Parliament may not be psychologically appropriate since people would be warming up to his presence and his potential leadership in the country. These things take time. PR states continue to govern and takeover will not be talked about until later, here there are two options: (a) PR will make a bid before 2010 (possibly next year) or (b) PR will make a bid in 2010 itself, if General Elections are called then. (GE may be called because even if Pak Lah hands over the reigns peaceably to Najib, he still may need to validate his Prime Ministership)
  3. Anwar wins. No crossovers are done yet. UMNO Assembly meets in December, Pak Lah is challenged and loses; UMNO changes leadership and Malaysia gets a new PM. It is still a BN-PR fight.
  4. Anwar loses. UMNO negotiates with PKR/PAS/PR to form an alternative coalition or bloc. But I doubt anything would emerge from this.
  5. Anwar loses. Public outcry. Some speculation as to clampdown again?
  6. Anwar wins. The sodomy charge goes into full swing. Anwar is convicted. Public outcry.
  7. Anwar wins. Sodomy charge goes full swing. Insufficient evidence to convict. Or PKR produces good counter evidence, as Raja Petra seems to claim exists. PR soars.

There are multiple outcomes and more, beyond the above. Actually I would ideally like to draw one of those branch charts that I used to love when doing probability trees. Remember those? And then we could assign probability numbers and ratios to each branch, and calculate a probability model for possible outcomes. Investors would then use this to calculate political risk in Malaysia – something they really could afford right now.

Maybe I will very well do it….

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.