COMMENT | 2021 – any hope of political regeneration?

COMMENT | We all know what the world's oldest profession is. Well, politics is supposed to be the second-oldest profession. 2020 should have marked a watershed in the modern history of Malaysia when one truth - the scourge of gerontocracy - was truly shattered.

A gerontocracy is a form of oligarchical rule in which a party is ruled by leaders who are significantly older than the rest of the members. In many, if not all our political parties, power accumulates with age, making the oldest the holders of the most power. And as we have witnessed, this advantage is too often used to create a dynasty and before you know it, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

2020 began with a bang when the sixth prime minister and numero uno of Umno was completely exposed as a kleptocrat. Yet, at the end of 2020, he still bestrode the country like a colossus.

Then in February, in a rather clumsy Sheraton Move, the nonagenarian "saviour of the nation" gave up power to the new Perikatan coalition… just like that! Yet, by the end of 2020, he was still being courted by Pakatan Harapan hopefuls for another go at a "grand coalition"...