With Hung Parliament, Malaysian Voters Feelings Mixed
Tracking Global Events | November 23, 2022
On November 19th, 2022, voters went to the polls in Malaysia, Southeast Asia’s most vibrant democracy, according to The Economist’s Democracy Index. Despite a long democratic history, recent political crises have been marked by the collapse of two separate coalition Governments and the resignation of two Prime Ministers, amid separate scandals. For the first time since Malaysia’s independence, the country is Racing a hung parliament, ushering in a political stalemate. With parties failing to form a coalition Government, Malaysia’s king is set to select the next Prime Minister. To better understand Malaysian sentiment toward the political roadblocks, Premise released a survey on a variety of related political issues.
Insights
- Just 27% of respondents approve or strongly approve of how the right-wing Barisan Nasional has performed since returning to power as the leading coalition. 36% identified Pakatan Harapan as the political coalition they supported, which won 37% of the popular vote on election day.
- Corruption continues to be a dominant issue, with 60% of respondents strongly agreeing that “corruption is a serious issue” in Malaysia, with an additional 27% somewhat agreeing. This comes just three months after former Prime Minister Razak was imprisoned for his role in the 1MDB corruption scandal.
- 63% identified economic issues as the main motivating factor when voting. The party that won the most seats was Parti Islam Se-Malaysia (PAS), a far-right Islamist group that has previously called for Sharia law in Malaysia.
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Methodology
Premise collected sentiment data about the Malaysian election, receiving 543 responses in the days before the November 19 election. This survey utilized a convenience sample which was weighted by age and gender at the national level.
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Premise offers a unique ability to quickly source information from real people on the ground in hard-to-reach places. Over five million people in 140 countries are using the Premise app on their smartphones, enabling our customers to monitor a situation over time and employ a data-driven approach to timely decision-making. To learn more about Premise, watch our tech demo or get in touch with us.