Beyond Autonomy: The Ripple Effects of Sabah Elections on Federal Power

Sabah’s voters delivered a stunning rebuke to Malaysia’s peninsula-based parties at the 29 November state election. The impact will extend beyond Kota Kinabalu; Sabah will likely play a more formalised and clearly defined role in the current and future administrations in Putrajaya.

The locally based Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) coalition, which won 29 seats in the 73-seat assembly, has retained power as the linchpin of a ruling coalition with 48 state assemblymen. This includes 12 lawmakers from other local parties and independents. They are joined by the peninsula-based Barisan Nasional (BN) and Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalitions, which bring a combined seven seats. Parti Warisan Sabah (Warisan) will helm the opposition bench with 25 seats.

The state election carries serious implications for the Unity Government’s (UG) anchor PH, as it exposes the coalition’s geographical limits and underscores the continued influence of Sabah parties in federal politics. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s PKR had aspired to expand its footprint in the state while DAP aimed to defend its turf in ethnically-mixed constituencies. In the end, PKR won only one seat, which was widely attributed to the candidate’s personal gravitas, while DAP’s standing in the assembly collapsed from six seats to zero. BN campaigned for the restoration of the coalition’s dominance in the Sabah government, but the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) — the preeminent party in BN — saw its number of seats falling from 14 to six. Coalition member Parti Rakyat Bersatu Sabah (PBRS) won one seat.

Sabah-specific issues weighed heavily. In recent months, Sabahans have widely expressed frustration with economic conditions, particularly infrastructure deficiencies. Sabah’s demands for the federal government to honour the terms of the Malyasia Agreement 1963 (MA63), most saliently the return of 40 per cent of tax revenue generated from Sabah, momentously seized the public imagination.

Warisan, as the state opposition, reaped dividends from the discontent. Sabah’s GRS-led former government was able to fend off such sentiments, as well as a corruption scandal, but it held incumbency advantages and benefited from challengers’ weak campaigns and poor candidate selection. Despite being in the federal UG, Sabah local parties could distance themselves from the unfulfilled MA63 promises to a greater extent than the peninsula-based parties overseeing federal politics.

National-level issues also inspired the voter backlash against peninsula parties, PH’s component parties. PKR also became embroiled in a corruption scandal, to which voters appear to have shown distaste, both for PKR as the culpable party and for DAP as a silent coalition partner. Tellingly, voter turnout was lower in urban areas — around 50-55 per cent, below the statewide 64 per cent — where such issues matter more. Among those who turned out, the rejection of PH was staggering. In five years, DAP has suffered a 50 percentage point swing in the seats it contested, from winning almost 80 per cent of votes in 2020 to barely 30 per cent in 2025. Warisan defeated DAP in every instance and won 16 of the 22 seats that PH contested.

PKR’s Saifuddin Nasution has downplayed the implications for PH, arguing that GRS’ victory over Warisan suggests voters chose the local party that advocated for closer cooperation with the federal government. BN has suffered a further setback with the sudden death of UMNO state chief Bung Mokhtar Radin just days after the elections. The party is also divided over BN’s decision to join the GRS government. 

The state election carries serious implications for the Unity Government’s (UG) anchor PH, as it exposes the coalition’s geographical limits and underscores the continued influence of Sabah parties in federal politics.

DAP has done more public soul-searching. Mindful that its urban electoral base spans Peninsular and East Malaysia, the party’s responses immediately extended beyond Sabah to the whole country. Secretary-General Anthony Loke declared a six-month reform watch period after which the party’s Cabinet members will resign — while remaining in parliamentary government — if the Madani administration does not deliver sufficient reforms. More significantly, DAP has reignited advocacy for the long-contested recognition of the Chinese-medium secondary school Unified Examination Certificate (UEC). This attempt at consolidating its political base risks stoking communal tensions. 

With the next general election due within two years, and the tenure of Sarawak’s legislative assembly expiring in February 2027, the federal government must meaningfully deliver on MA63 issues in Sabah and maintain goodwill with Sarawak’s GRS, the state’s juggernaut coalition.

Sarawak and Sabah were pivotal to PH’s ability to form the government — a role that will surely continue, particularly with PH’s tenuous grip on the peninsula. The 81 seats PH won at the November 2022 general election, exceeding the Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition’s 74 seats, put PH chief Anwar in the driver’s seat to cobble together a ruling coalition. PH won nine seats in Sarawak and Sabah; PN won three. Without East Malaysia, PH’s advantage would have dwindled to a wafer-thin 72 seats versus PN’s 71. The appointment of PKR Sabah chief Mustapha Sakmud as the Minister responsible for Sabah and Sarawak suggests that Anwar wants PH to preserve the coalition’s remaining influence in the two states. 

To maintain its anchor role in the federal government, the immediate objective for PH ahead of the next general election is to negotiate with GRS and GPS to maintain PH’s hold in urban areas and ethnically-mixed demographics, while allowing local coalitions to maintain their dominance in the majority of the constituencies in Sabah and Sarawak. This approach would constrain PH’s ability to expand beyond urban seats, but this would still be preferable compared to the prospects of an East Malaysian wipeout.

PH’s Sabah election fallout has significantly weakened its bargaining power vis-à-vis GRS and GPS. PH has recognised the growing influence of local parties and indicated a willingness to play a supporting role, reflected in its decision to contest less than 30 per cent of the Sabah seats. BN, on the other hand, contested in the majority of constituencies and pledged to restore its dominance in Sabah. In the context of power sharing, PH’s posture may cultivate Anwar’s favour with Sabah and Sarawak. 

Malaysia is in unprecedented territory. The outcome of the Sabah elections, along with the upcoming Sarawak polls within the next year, goes beyond mere demands for greater state autonomy. Developments in these two states are intensifying uncertainty over the composition and direction of the next federal government. 

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