Abdullah Ahmad Badawi
Abdullah bin Ahmad Badawi, also known as Pak Lah, was a Malaysian politician and civil servant who served as the fifth prime minister of Malaysia from 2003 to 2009. A member of UMNO, he was the party's president from 2004 to 2009 and led the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition during his premiership.
Born in Bayan Lepas, Penang, Abdullah was educated at the University of Malaya and began his career in the Malaysian civil service before entering politics in 1978 as the Member of Parliament for Kepala Batas, a seat he held until 2013. He later served in several ministerial portfolios, including education, defence and foreign affairs, before being appointed deputy prime minister under Mahathir Mohamad.
Abdullah assumed the premiership following Mahathir’s resignation in 2003 and initially enjoyed strong public support, promoting institutional reform, anti-corruption measures, and a vision of moderate Islam through his concept of Islam Hadhari. His administration focused on economic development and regional growth initiatives, but his later years in office were marked by economic challenges, declining public approval, and criticism over governance and media freedom. These factors contributed to significant losses for the ruling coalition in the 2008 Malaysian general election, after which he stepped down in 2009.
Early life and education
Abdullah was born on 26 November 1939 in Kampung Perlis, Bayan Lepas, Penang, into a prominent religious family. His paternal grandfather, Syeikh Abdullah Badawi Fahim, was of Hadrami descent and was a respected religious scholar and nationalist. He was among the founding members of Hizbul Muslimin, which later evolved into the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, and served as the first Mufti of Penang following Malaysia’s independence.His father, Ahmad Badawi, was a religious teacher and active member of UMNO. His mother, Kailan Haji Hassan, died in Kuala Lumpur on 2 February 2004 at the age of 80. Abdullah's maternal grandfather, Ha Su-chiang, also known as Hassan Salleh, was an Utsul Muslim from Sanya, Hainan.
Abdullah received his early education at Permatang Bertam Primary School, Kepala Batas from 1947. Then, he continued his secondary education at Bukit Mertajam High School and later attended Methodist Boys' School, Penang for his sixth form. In 1964, he graduated from the University of Malaya with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Islamic Studies.
Civil service (1964–1978)
After graduating from the University of Malaya, he joined the Malaysian Administrative and Diplomatic Corps in 1964. He served as Director of Youth's Ministry Department at the Ministry of Youth and Sport as well as member of the National Operations Council. He resigned in 1978 to become a member of parliament for his constituency of Kepala Batas in northern Seberang Perai.Early political career (1978–2003)
After Abdullah was elected as the Member of Parliament for Kepala Batas in 1978 general election, he served as the parliamentary secretary to the minister of federal territories from 1978 until 1980 and deputy minister of federal territories from 1980 until 1981. Brought on as a minister without portfolio in 1981, he was responsible for the implementation of the Look East policy.When a dispute erupted within the United Malays National Organisation divided it into two camps, colloquially known as 'Team A' and 'Team B', comprising Mahathir loyalists and supporters of former finance minister Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and former deputy prime minister Musa Hitam, Abdullah was removed from his position as defence minister. However, he did not join the now-defunct Semangat 46 splinter party set up by Tengku Razaleigh. Instead, Mahathir brought Abdullah into the pro tem committee of the reconstituted UMNO or New UMNO as its vice-president upon the party's founding in February 1988. During a cabinet reshuffle in 1991, Mahathir brought him back into government as the minister of foreign affairs. Despite losing the vice presidency in the 1993 UMNO elections, he remained in government.
In January 1999, Abdullah was appointed acting deputy president in UMNO and deputy prime minister, replacing Anwar Ibrahim in both roles after the latter was removed removed from government, expelled from UMNO, and arrested, sparking the Reformasi movement. Chosen by Mahathir as his candidate for deputy president in the 2000 United Malays National Organisation leadership election, Abdullah was perceived as a political lightweight that did not possess enough political influence or support to challenge Mahathir's preeminence within the party. This was attributed to his refusal to engage in money politics, which prevented him from building a base. The election was held under rules that prohibited anyone else from contesting the positions of president and deputy president.
Prime Minister (2003–2009)
Domestic affairs
Becoming prime minister after Mahathir's resignation in October 2003, Abdullah entered office espousing a populist reform agenda. Some of his first acts in government were to shelve several mega-projects initiated under Mahathir that were perceived as wasteful and associated with political corruption, establish a royal commission to investigate allegations of corruption in the police force and propose reform, and introduce a code of ethics requiring cabinet ministers and elected representatives to declare their assets. Multiple anti-corruption investigations were also launched against government officials and businessmen that resulted in arrests. He also broke with past practice and appointed professionals to head government-linked companies instead of politicians, calling for an end to the culture of the "iron rice bowl" and towards a culture rewarding performance.Abdullah's personal popularity, as well as a nonconfrontational style of government that was favourably compared to his predecessor's perceived authoritarianism, delivered him a resounding victory in the 2004 Malaysian general election, where his Barisan Nasional coalition secured 198 out of 219 available seats. However, observers noted that redelineation exercises the previous year under Mahathir also played a factor in the scale of victory.File:Abdullah badawi bush powell.jpg|thumb|left|Abdullah with United States President George W. Bush at the White House in 2004The momentum of reform slowed after the 2004 general election, and Malaysia's ranking in that year's Corruption Perceptions Index fell two places from 37th to 39th. The continued prevalence of money politics in the 2004 UMNO election, coupled with an abortive attempt to appoint Abdullah's son-in-law, Khairy Jamaluddin, to head a government-linked company cast a shadow on the former's reform agenda, which faltered with the defeat of his supporters in the party's leadership election by conservative elements; the party itself was resistant to the kind of reform Abdullah wanted to institute as its organisation and the loyalties of its middle- and lower-rung leaders relied on political patronage that took the form of government contracts and development funds.
Instead, Abdullah shifted towards attempting a reform of political culture within the country, introducing the concept of Islam Hadhari, a moderate-to-progressive interpretation of Islam that called for religious tolerance and modernity. Crucially, it appropriated what had been the opposition Malaysian Islamic Party 's themes of social justice and distributive equality that had helped them secure electoral gains against UMNO in the 1999 Malaysian general election.
On the economic front, Malaysia experienced steady economic growth throughout Abdullah's years in office, but inflation remained a persistent issue. Under his administration, the Malaysian ringgit's peg to the US Dollar was ended in 2005. The agricultural sector, traditionally neglected in favour of the industrial and services industries, received significant investment from Abdullah's government. When rising costs led to the government lowering petrol subsidies in 2006, street protests were launched in response. These were violently dispersed by riot police. Further plans for restructuring government subsidies in the face of rising fuel prices internationally also faced criticism as Malaysia was at the time a net exporter of petroleum and natural gas. The Ninth Malaysia Plan launched by Abdullah covering government expenditure from 2006 to 2010 retained much of the costly and divisive positive discriminatory measures introduced by the New Economic Policy.
By 2007, a slew of scandals had left a severe dent in public confidence in Abdullah's premiership. These included the acquittal of businessman Eric Chia, among the first to be arrested in the anti-corruption drive at the beginning of Abdullah's premiership, the murder of Shaariibuugiin Altantuyaa by two members of the police, which implicated deputy prime minister Najib Razak, as well as corruption allegations leveled against government ministers, the anti-corruption agency chief, inspector general of police, and the chief justice, among others. Abdullah himself was also accused of engaging in nepotism. Mahathir had also began to openly criticise Abdullah after the latter cancelled a major infrastructure project in 2006, one of the last decided upon by Mahathir before he left office, going as far as saying he regretted choosing Abdullah as his successor. Conversely, his administration's decision to resume a number of high-profile mega-projects such as the Bakun Dam elicited public criticism in the face of rising costs of living.
Malay nationalist sentiment was also played up by leading UMNO politicians such as Hishammuddin Hussein, who infamously brandished the keris, a traditional dagger with cultural significance in three successive UMNO general assemblies, which was interpreted by non-Malay communities as a threat not to encroach on the special position of Malays. The continued deterioration of relations between the country's ethnic and religious groups coincided with a rise in Islamist sentiment in the country that the government promoted, with Abdullah openly referring to the country as an "Islamic state".
The government at this time was also rocked by two successive large-scale public protests, the first for free-and-fair elections and the second by the country's Indian minority against racial discrimination. Both were dispersed with the use of tear gas and chemical-laced water cannons by armed riot police. As many as 12 members of the opposition were also arrested for their participation in the protests which were deemed illegal.
These events precipitated Barisan Nasional's poor showing in the 2008 Malaysian general election held in March, where the ruling coalition lost its two-thirds majority in parliament and control over four state governments to a united opposition riding on popular discontent. Abdullah and his government's reputation was further damaged in September that year when it invoked the Internal Security Act to arrest opposition parliamentarian Teresa Kok, online blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin, and journalist Tan Hoon Cheng, which prompted law minister Zaid Ibrahim to resign in opposition.
Faced with an broadly liberal opposition seen as a threat to Malay supremacy, the poor performance of UMNO in the 2008 election also had the effect of strengthening the Malay monarchies that served as symbolic protectors of Malay interests, which contrasted with their previous position during Mahathir's premiership.