With Malaysia moving towards a two-party system, Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) is finding itself stuck in a twilight zone. It is passionately anti-BN, but neither can it agree with everything that Pakatan Rakyat stands for.
Nor, for that matter, is Pakatan too enthusiastic about roping it into its fold.
When it fielded candidates in the 2008 general election, PSM was not yet a registered party although it had submitted its application to the Registrar of Societies a decade earlier. So three of the four PSM candidates contested under the PKR logo and the other as an independent candidate.
The party did rather well in that election, with Dr D Michael Jeyakumar beating MIC president S Samy Vellu for the Sungai Siput parliament seat and PSM chairman Nasir Hashim winning the Selangor state seat of Kota Damansara.
PSM secretary-general S Arutchelvan lost his bid for Semenyih, also a Selangor state seat. M Sarasvathy, who contested as the independent candidate in the Perak state constituency of Jelapang, also lost. The winner was a DAP candidate who later quit her party.
All four contested in the same constituencies in last year’s election, but this time using the PSM logo. However, only Dr Jeyakumar won.
In Kota Damansara, a PAS candidate filed nomination papers despite an agreement between PSM and Pakatan not to contest against each other. Although the PAS man later pulled out of the race, the damage had been done and BN won the seat.
In Jelapang, DAP again entered the race and again won. In Semenyih, Arutchelvan lost to BN in a three-cornered fight involving PKR.
PSM accepts membership from anyone subscribing to its socialist ideology. Nevertheless, its support comes mostly from estate workers, factory hands and others trapped in urban poverty.
The party conducts regular campaigns to spread word about what it struggles for, to raise awareness about current issues and to explain why it is against BN. Currently it is on a nationwide campaign billed as PSM Berjuang Bersama Rakyat (PSM Struggles with the People).
Detention
In 2011, it embarked on an anti-BN campaign called Udahlah tu… Bersaralah (Enough Already… Quit Now), which led to the arrest of 30 activists in Penang.
Six of the activists, who included Dr Jeyakumar, were held under the Emergency (Public Order and Prevention of Crime Ordinance) Ordinance. The widespread condemnation of their month-long detention catalysed the repeal of the ordinance.
Many Malaysians who are keen to see the end of BN rule wish that PSM would join the opposition alliance, but as far as the party is concerned, the ball is in Pakatan’s court.
Meanwhile, PSM is inviting other groups to join what it calls the Left Movement, the formation of which was approved by the party’s convention last year. It has since received support from the small Parti Rakyat Malaysia, which is led by Rohana Ariffin.
Political observers, citing the blurring of the line between left-wing and right-wing social idealism since the end of the Cold War, do not see much of a future for the Left Movement.
Neither are they sure that PSM would be comfortable as part of Pakatan as long as it holds on too tightly to its leftist idealism. DAP’s youth wing is known as DAP Socialist Youth, but its brand of socialism appears to be poles apart from PSM’s.
The question that remains is whether Pakatan will finally be willing to accommodate a small group of leftists to give it that little more strength in its struggle to topple BN from Putrajaya.
