Will the opposition parties ever become a workable coalition?

It was reported a few days back that the opposition parties are now in the midst of making their loose alliance into a formal coalition of opposition parties, i.e. Pakatan Rakyat (PR). The question that is now in the minds of many is could they pull it off given the different directions each party seems to be taking. Perhaps the best way to answer this question is to look at the way Barisan Nasional (BN) works.

i) A brief description of how BN works:

BN is the enlargement of the Alliance Party in the aftermath of the May 13 tragedy. It is a coalition of 14 political parties led by UMNO. Next in line is MCA which serves as the senior partner of the coalition followed by MIC (all parties mentioned formed the original Alliance Party).

The coalition is made up of political parties that represents different ethnic communities in the country where decisions affecting different ethnic communities are made behind close-door negotiations between the political parties involved. In reality, all decisions that are made is balanced against the interests of UMNO and its constituent.

As can be observed from the way BN works, UMNO is the anchor of the coalition providing the much needed leadership and stability to ensure the political crisis experienced by it's key partners, i.e. MCA, MIC and Gerakan, does not destroy BN. Let's now look at some of the problems faced by the opposition parties as they attempt to form a coalition.


ii) PR and the problems of creating a workable coalition:

PR in its current form is, at best, a loose alliance of opposition parties that banded together to contest in the last election. The results of the election was unanticipated by these parties. As such, they were caught by surprise with the results as the ordinary Malaysians.

A year on, we can observe that these parties seem to work at cross-purpose with one another. For example, the spate between PAS and DAP in the Selangor state government over the sale of beer. At the national level, PAS seems to be keeping it's option opened with its top leadership engaging in dialogue with UMNO.

The problem that comes to my mind is simply this ... Can the proposed coalition work together? Put in another way, how would decisions that affect the proposed coalition as a whole be worked out? Would it be like BN with UMNO as the de facto decider? Would PKR play the same role here? Can PAS and DAP accept such a structure?

If PR choose to be different, that is decision-making would be based on negotiation among equals, can PAS and DAP see eye-to-eye? PAS's political platform is based on Islam while DAP's is secular. How would PKR balance both parties here?

Also, how would PR differentiate themselves from BN? BN is based on a communal politics approach. So would PR position themselves in the political market in order to gain support from the various ethnic groups in the country?

And then there is the question of Sabah and Sarawak. How would the proposed coalition address the issue of representation from Sabah and Sarawak, given the fact with electoral support from both states, grabbing political power from BN is impossible.


iii) More questions than answer:

So what are the answers to the questions that I posed here? It is impossible at this juncture to answer any of these questions until the plans for the proposed coalition is offered for public scrutiny. Nonetheless, it will be interesting to observe how the opposition parties will work towards these common goal. I await with bated breath on the plans about formalizing the coalition, which could change Malaysian political landscape.