Formidable obstacles remain for Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, not least the sodomy allegation that is still hanging over his head.

ON TUESDAY, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim won a thumping victory. His success in Permatang Pauh has re-energised his “comeback”.

Having endured the full brunt of the Umno/BN machinery as well as a range of other unexpected hindrances in an ugly, no-holds barred contest he has earned both the sympathy and admiration of many Malaysians – most of whom aren’t his natural supporters both in Permatang Pauh and across the nation.

This point is very important. Anwar – whatever we think of him and many of us are deeply sceptical – is looking more and more like our future Prime Minister.

There is a mounting sense of inevitability to his impending accession. As I’ve said time and again, his passage to the premiership has been accelerated by the unending and unfair attacks on him and the ensuing martyr status that has been bestowed on him because of these attacks.

In short, Anwar’s rise is due more to Umno and BN’s seemingly visceral fear of one man and their continuous missteps than it is, to his own capabilities.

Anwar will be sworn back into Parliament today. It is to be hoped that he will be in place, just in time to sit across from Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi during his budget address.

This will be a very significant development, as Parliament once again becomes the premier “forum” for Malaysia’s leaders as they debate publicly on our future.

Anwar’s presence in the House will heighten tension and indeed excitement. However, the political electricity that he will bring with him could end up overwhelming the institution and our fragile and immature democratic culture.

He needs to be mindful that given the Barisan’s near total failure, he now possesses the capacity to bring Malaysia forward or take it backward.

Still, speculation is rife as to Anwar’s next move, especially since the Sept 16 deadline he has set for his Pakatan Rakyat coalition to take power is fast approaching.

Formidable obstacles remain however, not least of which is the sodomy allegation still hanging over his head.

For Umno and the BN, Permatang Pauh II (or IV, if you count their other clumsy attempts) is just another embarrassing and brutish muddle in an ongoing series of strategic fumbles.

Their tactics do not appear to have changed since the catastrophic March 8 general election. It may be hard for some BN supporters to understand but the present modus operandi will definitely result in their defeat in the next polls, which may come sooner than we think.

Where to begin in this long list of missteps? A Merdeka Centre poll released a month before the by-election showed that 66% of Malaysians, and notably 57% of the Malays surveyed felt that the sodomy allegations were politically motivated.

Another poll amongst 544 Malay voters in Permatang Pauh released on the eve of voting indicated that 59% also felt the case was political, while 56.7% did not believe in the confession of Anwar’s accuser Saiful Bukhari Azlan.

All these should have been a red light to Barisan tacticians that the sodomy allegations were not going to dent Anwar’s momentum. Instead, Saiful’s “confession” (made interestingly enough, before nomination day) was played on an almost continuous loop by the Umno outposts and their mainstream media surrogates.

This backfired when the imam who witnessed the oath later revealed that he was reportedly ordered to do so, and that Saiful had let several inconsistencies slip in the process.

Many pundits in the lead-up to the voting spoke of the supposed conservatism and moral absolutism of the Malay community outside the major urban areas.

They argued that this conservatism would torpedo Anwar’s chances. Well, they were wrong. The voters of Permatang Pauh swept this aside.

The Malay community (as with all Malaysians) is more politically astute than often thought and even the supposedly “traditional” old folk can see through “spin” and deception. You cannot bamboozle and lie to the people of Malaysia any more.

They will strike back until you tell them the truth.

As I said the inhabitants of Permatang Pauh (as with all other Malaysians), are more in touch with the principles of justice and fairplay than most politicos give them credit for. In short when they smell a rat they know what to do.

What else went wrong for Barisan? How about their candidate, Ariff Shah Omar Shah (a decent enough guy) expecting to win back the support of the Chinese community simply on the strength of his being able to speak Mandarin?

How about the needless and unnecessary police roadblocks that was set up all over Permatang Pauh – how many commuters who were not planning on voting that day suddenly decided to risk rain and traffic out of fury at the congestion caused?

What about an Election Commission that did a good job but still lacked the much needed transparency and engagement to win support across the parties as well as the public?

We shouldn’t forget the claim that a great many of the Umno members in the district did not vote for their candidate. All this may be hard to believe but it doesn’t give me any real pleasure pointing out the blunders made by the BN.

At the moment, failure appears to be stamped on the BN’s every step and success on the Pakatan’s.

This doesn’t please me, because like all Malaysians I want competition in the political arena not a walkover.

Still, this dreary succession of failures will not be halted until the old Umno/BN formula has been tossed out and new policies adopted.

Sadly the BN with the sole exception of Tengku Razaleigh (whose frankly worded press statement comes as a relief) appears unaware of how hopeless the situation truly is.

Permatang Pauh was always going to be an uphill battle, but the damage caused by Anwar’s return could have at least been minimised.

The leadership of the ruling party has failed miserably at both.

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