Bersih grades Unity Government with a D after two years in power

KUALA LUMPUR - The Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (Bersih) gave a grade of D, equivalent to 45.8 per cent, to the Unity Government after two years in power.

Its Chairman Muhammad Faisal Abdul Aziz said that the score reflected a significant gap in terms of progress, advancement, and actions toward implementing reforms.

According to him, Bersih emphasised that election manifestos remained binding even when other parties joined the coalition, and this should have provided an advantage in fulfilling all reform agendas.

"In the 70 per cent scoring scale for manifesto accountability, which includes electoral reform, two out of seven initiatives were still in progress, while the rest had not been implemented.

"In the area of institutional reform, five out of 18 had been achieved, seven were in progress, and the remaining had not been fulfilled. For civil liberties, three had been implemented, two were in progress, and three remained unachieved.

"In terms of comparative benchmarks with previous prime ministers, the current Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, scored only 18 out of 30 per cent," he said.

He made this statement during the forum titled "Have We Achieved Change?", which also marked the launch of the Two-Year Assessment Report on the Madani Government (2TM) and the commemoration of eight years since Bersih 5, held here on Tuesday.

Also present were former Bersih chairperson (2013-2018) Maria Chin Abdullah and former Bersih chairperson (2018-2023) Thomas Fann.

Faisal argued that the government's excuse of not having enough time to implement reforms was no longer valid, given that they had already reached the midpoint of their five-year term.

He further noted that previous administrations had proven that major reforms could be accomplished within just two years.

"Therefore, Bersih proposed 12 recommendations to the government ahead of the 16th General Election (GE16), including introducing a 10-year term limit for the Prime Minister, the Parliamentary Services Act (PSA), the Political Funding Act, separating the roles of the Attorney General and Public Prosecutor, and others.

"Now is the time to strengthen democracy and implement robust electoral institutional reforms while protecting civil liberties.

"To achieve these goals, we will continue to work collaboratively and engage constructively by exerting pressure on the government, opposition, Parliament, and stakeholders to support the reform agenda," he added.