abstract:The politics of Malaysia takes place in the framework of a federal representative democratic constitutional monarchy, in which the Yang di-Pertuan Agong is head of state and the Prime Minister of Malaysia is the head of government. Executive power is exercised by the federal government and the 13 state governments.
At this stage, the right place to look is not at Mr Anwar himself but at the process by which he has been brought to trial, the laws under which he has been held, and the light both of these things cast on the conduct ofpolitics in Malaysia.
But for Dr Mahathir the dispute goes much further than party politics, turning as it does on his vision of a modernised Malaysia with a modernised, tolerant Islam.
The contest between theocratic politics and a notionally secular state looks even more unequal in another ex-British land, Malaysia, where freedom of choice in religion is enshrined in the federal constitution, but Islamic law is imposed with growing strictness on the Muslim majority.