SAWT BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL

| 29 March 2024, Friday |

Malaysian opposition leader Anwar appointed prime minister

Malaysia’s opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim was named prime minister on Thursday and will take office at 5 p.m, according to the sultan’s palace.

An unprecedented hung parliament resulted from the general election on Saturday, with neither of the two main alliances—one led by Anwar and the other by former premier Muhyiddin Yassin—being able to win enough seats in the house to form a government right away.

Anwar’s appointment caps a three-decade long journey from heir apparent to a prisoner convicted of sodomy, to longtime opposition leader.

The 75-year-old has time and again been denied the premiership despite getting within striking distance over the years: he was deputy prime minister in the 1990s and the official prime minister-in-waiting in 2018.

In between, he spent nearly a decade in jail for sodomy and corruption in what he says were politically motivated charges aimed at ending his career.

    Source:
  • Reuters