Malaysia's leading opposition figure, Anwar Ibrahim, cleared a major hurdle in his race to win power when an Islamist party endorsed him on Wednesday as leader of an anti-government alliance. The move by Parti Islam Se-Malaysia (PAS) came after Anwar's convincing win in a by-election and was made despite reservations among some sections of the Islamic party about the "rainbow alliance" of which they are a part.
However, political analysts say that Anwar may struggle to hold his coalition together, let along find the 30 defectors from the ranks of government MPs he needs to join him to win power. The government has been on the back foot since losing its two-thirds majority in an election in March and there were calls on Wednesday for Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to quit.
Anwar also faces prosecution for sodomy, a reprise of charges which saw him jailed and in the late 1990s and forced him out of politics for a decade. If convicted in a trial starting on September 10, his political career would be at an end.
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