Beyond the Ballot Box

Petaling Jaya was originally developed in the 1950s as one of Malaysia’s first planned suburbs, built to house residents moving out of the crowded city centre of Kuala Lumpur. Decades later, many of its neighbourhoods are ageing even as demand to live in PJ remains strong because of its central location and economic activity. Now, a new local plan aims to transform the city from a low-rise suburb into a denser, more vibrant urban centre that can attract younger residents while remaining liveable for existing communities. In this episode, we unpack that vision and what it could mean for the future of Petaling Jaya, with Kusaaliny Mahendran, Councillor, Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ). Kusha is also a member of the Democratic Action Party (DAP) and is on the committee of the DAP’s socialist youth wing. We also spent some time talking about some of the heightened racial and religious tensions recently involving temples. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Malaysia’s fight against corruption remains one of the country’s most persistent political and institutional challenges. While the latest results from the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index show Malaysia improving slightly to 52 points and ranking 54th globally, the broader picture remains complicated. Progress in rankings does not necessarily mean corruption has been meaningfully reduced, especially as major controversies continue to surface around powerful institutions, corporate interests, and the very bodies tasked with enforcing anti-corruption laws.We speak to Raymon Ram, President, Transparency International Malaysia, about how the government is doing in its fight against corruption.Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

MANDIRI is a youth-driven civil society organisation founded in 2024 that aims to strengthen democratic participation, social justice, and civic engagement among young people. It is established by a group of activists, namely Amir Hadi, Mohamad Alshatry and Dobby Chew – names you probably recognise if you’ve been listening to the show for some time. In this episode, we speak to Dobby Chew about what the organisation is all about, the state of civil society in Malaysia today, and the upcoming MUDA elections in which Dobby is contesting.Image Credit: MANDIRI MalaysiaSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Malaysia today finds itself at an important juncture. For starters, the MADANI government is currently led by a reformist coalition and a Prime Minister who has championed good governance and institutional reform for decades. The past few weeks have been especially pivotal, though. On the one hand, you’ve got a recent Bloomberg investigation into alleged “corporate mafia” behaviour within the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), including controversy surrounding Chief Commissioner Azam Baki.  This has reignited public concerns about integrity and continues to impact public trust in the government and institutions. At the same time, the government has tabled major reform initiatives  from the long-debated Attorney General–Public Prosecutor split to a constitutional amendment to introduce a two-term limit for the Prime Minister. So, how do we make sense of the government’s reform agenda so far, particularly when it comes to prosecutorial independence and the structures of the MACC?We speak to Maha Balakrishnan, Parliamentary and Policy Advocacy Specialist. Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Two days ago, the U.S. and Israel launched massive joint air operations against Iran, saying they were targeting military infrastructure and seeking regime change. Hundreds of civilians have been killed, including more than a hundred young Iranian girls, whose school was bombed. Several senior Iranian military figures and politicians have also been killed, including the Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. Iran has since launched retaliatory attacks on U.S. bases across the Gulf. The confrontation is ongoing and continues to escalate.The death of Ayatollah Khamenei has invited a spectrum of responses from outright condemnation of what many see as illegal aggression, to support from those who argue that removing authoritarian regimes may create space for democracy. In this episode, we step back from the headlines to examine the first principles of geopolitics: who has the right to decide, and on what grounds.Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For the longest time, particularly since the late 90s, then-opposition parties from PKR to DAP to PAS campaigned on a platform of anti-corruption and anti-cronyism, against the Barisan Nasional. This only intensified during former, disgraced Prime Minister Najib Razak’s time in power and the 1MDB scandal. This ultimately led to the downfall of the Barisan Nasional government in 2018.The question is, how much do these parties actually practice the transparency and accountability they once demanded of others?Recently, the Institute of Malaysian and International Studies (IKMAS) at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), in collaboration with the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD), published a paper on the transparency index of political parties in Malaysia.In this episode, we speak to one of the co-authors of the paper, Dr Haris Zuan, from UKM, about what the findings reveal regarding internal democracy and financial transparency within Malaysia’s major political parties.Image credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We often hear about neighbourhoods being evicted, houses being torn down, and communities organising against the state or private developers, demanding fair compensation, proper consultation, and the right to remain on their land.Development, Displacement and Democracy: The Place of Eviction Protests in Malaysia is a paper that examines how these eviction protests function as an important but often overlooked form of democratic participation in Malaysia’s development process. The paper argues that eviction protests should be recognised as legitimate democratic actors and recommends stronger legal protections, institutionalised public consultation, and formal inclusion of CSOs to ensure more participatory and just development in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In this episode, we unpack the paper with its author, Jeremy Lim. Image Credit: socialis.netSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Take One Action is an initiative based in Scotland that uses film as a tool to help people make sense of the world. The organisation curates documentaries and features that explore themes like inequality, climate justice, human rights, and collective action, often pairing them with discussions, workshops, and conversations with activists, academics, and filmmakers. In this episode, we speak to Daisy Crooke, Events and Communities Coordinator, Take One Action, about the power of film in helping us make sense of the world and politics. Daisy Crooke is also working together with the Malaysian Freedom Film Network on their Emerging Curators Lab. For more information, visit: freedomfilm.my/emergingcuratorslabImage Credit: Take One ActionSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For many of us born in the 90s, we’ve only known one world: A world where the US has been the singular hegemon, leading what we call a unipolar world. This has been the case since the tail end of the Cold War and especially so after the fall of the Berlin Wall. But things are changing. There’s plenty of talk about a shift towards a multipolar world. This isn’t just what’s been said by leftists or anti-colonialists from the global south. It was also highlighted by the Canadian Prime Minister and former governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, in his speech at Davos on a new world order. He called it a “rupture.” So, how do we make sense of these changes? And what does it mean for Malaysia?In this two-part conversation, I speak to Dr Lim Teck Ghee, who’s an economic historian, author, and public intellectual. His new book “China Rising: USA and West Responses” is a compilation of over 50 column articles in Oriental Daily over the past 4 years, focused on, as the title suggests, the emergence of China as a global political and economic force. In part two of the conversation, we focus on: What are the possibilities of World War III with Taiwan as the flashpoint?Is it time for China to put the 1949 revolution behind it and accept Taiwan as a sovereign nation? The human rights violations in XinjiangShould China put its principle of non-interference aside and actively defend its allies militarilyWhat should ASEAN keep in mind as China continues to riseImage Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For many of us born in the 90s, we’ve only known one world: A world where the US has been the singular hegemon, leading what we call a unipolar world. This has been the case since the tail end of the Cold War and especially so after the fall of the Berlin Wall. But things are changing. There’s plenty of talk about a shift towards a multipolar world. This isn’t just what’s been said by leftists or anti-colonialists from the global south. It was also highlighted by the Canadian Prime Minister and former governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney in his speech at Davos on a new world order. He called it a “rupture.” So, how do we make sense of these changes? And what does it mean for Malaysia?In this two-part conversation, I speak to Dr Lim Teck Ghee, who’s an economic historian, author and public intellectual. His new book “China Rising: USA and West Responses” is a compilation of over 50 column articles in Oriental Daily over the past 4 years, focused on, as the title suggests, the emergence of China as a global political and economic force. In part one of the conversation, we focus on: The key features of a unipolar US-led world orderWhat shifting towards a multipolar world meansHow China went from a poor country to the second largest economyPopular misconceptions of ChinaWhat does democracy mean in China?Significance of Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney’s speech at DavosImage Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jeffrey Epstein was a financier and convicted sex offender whose network spanned the worlds of finance, politics, academia, and celebrity. Recently, the U.S. Department of Justice released what is now known as the Epstein Files. There are over 3 million pages, 2,000+ videos, and 180,000+ images, so far, including flight logs, emails, court filings, and internal notes detailing his activities and connections. Two rounds of document releases have so far painted an incredibly repulsive picture of sexual exploitation, trafficking, and elite complicity. Some of the highlights include: US President Donald Trump, who is mentioned in over 38,000 references, with the most serious allegation being a withdrawn 2016 federal lawsuit accusing him of raping a 13-year-old girl at Epstein’s Manhattan residence.Silicon Valley billionaires, including Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, and others, appearing hundreds of times. There are also emails and exchanges suggesting an international political network involving countries such as Israel, India, and Russia. All of this is merely scratching the surface of the Epstein files. To try and make sense of it all, we speak to Peter Beattie, Political Economist and Political Psychologist from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Image Credit: Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, 1993 via PicrylSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We often discuss the exploitation of labour, especially at the very bottom of the chain, namely the migrant workers who are frequently trapped in conditions that resemble modern-day slavery. But one thing we haven’t really interrogated is the role of business schools: what they teach, what they leave out, and whether the lessons and curriculum deal primarily with managing a boardroom and ensuring profitability, or if they reflect realities on the ground, where wealth and corporate success are often also built on the backs of exploited labour. In this episode, we speak to Dr Priya Sharma about exactly that. She is the Head of the Commercial Law & Justice Centre at the Sunway Business School. She’s also the co-editor of a book called Combating Modern Slavery: A Global Perspective.Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Recently, Bloomberg published an in-depth investigation into the recruitment of Bangladeshi migrant workers into Malaysia, exposing how inflated fees, cartel-like recruitment structures and political protection have trapped thousands of workers in debt, exploitation and, in some cases, human trafficking. The article explicitly names individuals linked to these cartels. We speak to Charles Santiago, co-chair of ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR), who was quoted in the article. Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Most of us know that elections are important. After all, they shape who governs us and how decisions get made. But we rarely stop to think about what actually happens behind the scenes: the hundreds, sometimes thousands of workers and volunteers who make sure polling day runs smoothly, especially polling staff on the ground. In this episode, we speak to Danesh Prakash Chacko, Chairperson of Persatuan Bertindak Pilihan Raya Bebas Dan Saksama (Tindak), about exactly that. Tindak is currently running a petugas programme that trains and mobilises citizens to serve as polling and counting agents. Click here if you’d like to sign up for Tindak’s Petugas program: https://sites.google.com/view/petugas-tindak-malaysia/homeImage Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Malaysia is incredibly polarised right now, especially across racial and religious lines. Perhaps that has always been the case to some degree, given the ethnocentric political parties and culture that have dominated a bulk of our history since independence and especially so post 1969. Things seem to be getting worse. You often get the sense that every community feels that they’re marginalised or that they don’t have a place in this country, or maybe that’s just the social media comment section. Of course, there’s no silver bullet to solving this. In this episode, we speak to Jason Wee, the founder of Architects of Diversity. We talk about some of the drivers of our racialised politics, if things are indeed getting worse and even the role of social media.Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Three things we often hear about Kuala Lumpur and the Klang Valley at large is that it’s incredibly congested, not walkable and that it is becoming increasingly unaffordable. But why do these problems persist? We speak to Aziff Azuddin, associate researcher at IMAN Research, about the greater Klang Valley’s urban design philosophy and key principles on building an equitable and inclusive city. Image Credit: ShutterstockSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It’s been a turbulent start to 2026. To kick off the year, the United States kidnapped Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Just days later, some of the biggest protests in Iran in decades erupted and continue to unfold. Some leaders, particularly in the West, have framed the unrest from the perspective of human rights and are calling for intervention, while others advise caution and warn against meddling in the business of sovereign nations.  All of this is unfolding on top of the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the protracted war between Russia and Ukraine, and many other unfolding crises that continue to shape global politics and public imagination. How do we make sense of this convergence of crises?What does it mean for the future of global order? My guest on today’s show is Vijay Prashad. Vijay is a historian, journalist, and public intellectual. He’s one of the most important thinkers in the world when it comes to geopolitics and understanding power. He’s written numerous books, including Washington Bullets: A History of the CIA, Coups, and Assassinations, On Cuba, and The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World. And he’s the director of the Tricontinental Institute For Social Research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You are probably already familiar with Teach For Malaysia, the education nonprofit that does incredible work by placing committed young leaders in under-resourced schools and developing them into long-term advocates for educational equity. It is one of, if not the most important, education nonprofits in the country. What many may not realise is that Teach For Malaysia is part of a global network called Teach For All, which traces its roots back to the late 80s. In 1989, Wendy Kopp founded Teach For America while still a university student herself. She later co-founded Teach For All, which has grown from strength to strength, expanding its wings across the globe. In this episode, we speak to Wendy Kopp about Teach For All’s origin story, the challenges they face, understanding global education inequities, and more. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Lim Yi Wei is the ADUN for Kampung Tunku and DAP Wanita national assistant publicity secretary. Yi Wei, whose parents were both teachers in public schools, is a social democrat at heart and believes in building a fairer and more equitable Malaysia for all.Recently, she penned an article titled "What Next for DAP," where she argued that the party’s social democratic roots have increasingly been overtaken by neoliberal thinking, and called for a clearer, values-driven return to politics centered on justice, equity, and the common good.In this episode, we talk to her about her personal journey in politics, the importance of social democracy, the limits of neoliberalism, and the future of the DAP.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We are all part of a system – a global capitalist neoliberal economy – that is geared towards profit maximisation over creating a fair and dignified world for everybody. Even the environment is seen as a commodity to be extracted and destroyed for profit. Technology is so advanced and we have created tremendous amounts of wealth, yet most people across the world do not earn enough to afford basic necessities. The rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer, and our nature is depleted further and further. Today, many young people struggle with stagnant wages, unaffordable housing, and healthcare. In his new book titled Notes on the Way Forward: A Socialist Perspective, Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj, who’s also the chairperson of Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM), takes a sharp look at the structural failures of capitalism and the alternatives before us.On today’s show, we speak with Dr. Kumar about how we can build a better, more sustainable, and dignified Malaysia for everyone.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.