Johari is clearly trying to reference what old men like him believe to be the "good old days" of Malaysian politics throughout the 1980s and the 1990s, where Umno was the titan on the scene and everyone else was practically mice. This era is obviously closely related to the rule of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, whose strongman and authoritarian style set the tone for this entire stretch in Malaysian politics. When old men tell us to go back to the good old days, one of the first obvious questions we should ask is: why did those good old days end? If any political party in Malaysia was truly able to single handedly achieve dominance, it would have done so by now. Johari is right insofar as having a dominant political body provides the most stability within a Westminister-based political system.

Source: The Star February 27, 2021 07:18 UTC