Malaysian politics runs on grudges and few illustrate that better than the one nursed by Rafizi Ramli.
A year after losing the deputy presidency of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s People’s Justice Party (PKR), he has built a vehicle for the disaffected, aimed squarely at the coalition of which he was once part.
Parti Bersama Malaysia – or Bersama, meaning “together” – is barely three months old under its new leadership, yet it has already rattled Malaysia’s governing alliance.
Taken over in May by Rafizi and fellow ex-minister Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad, Bersama recently gained another PKR defector in the form of Wong Chen, a three-term MP who spent almost 20 years in Anwar’s party before resigning his Subang seat on August 10.
The timing could hardly be worse for the ruling Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition, which has suffered back-to-back drubbings in state elections at the hands of Barisan Nasional, its erstwhile enemy turned federal partner.
Bersama now threatens to open a second front, drawing away reform-minded voters that PH cannot afford to lose – even as it insists it is a progressive alternative and more than a just spoiler.