After a checkered victory in Saturday's state elections that saw strong gains by the Malay-Islamist opposition, analysts say Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim faces a daunting task in uniting an increasingly polarized nation and strengthening his nascent unity government.
Anwar's multi-coalition unity government and the opposition Perikatan Nasional (PN) bloc, that includes the conservative Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, retained control of three states each, as widely expected. While the PN bloc, led by former Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, failed to alter the status quo, it did make major inroads in the government-controlled states and nearly swept all the seats on its own turf on the back of continous support from the ethnic Malay majority.
