National Professors Council fellow Azmi Hassan said Perikatan Nasional needed to face the reality that it could not be solely dependent on Malay support if it sought to form the federal government on its own one day.

He said allowing the non-Bumiputera associate wings to vote on the top five posts would show that these members were treated fairly in their parties.

“They currently lack non-Malay support, so this could be one way to attract the community’s support for PN,” he told FMT.

Ariff Aizuddin Azlan of Universiti Teknologi Mara agreed, saying Bersatu’s associate wing members should be given the same voice in the party elections as the women and youth wings.

He said it was necessary for Bersatu to expand the role of its associate wing to reflect a healthy democracy within the party.

However, Lau Zhe Wei of Universiti Islam Antarabangsa Malaysia said the Muhyiddin Yassin-led party should maintain the status quo to play it safe, particularly to appease its Bumiputera members, “unless, at some point, Bersatu wants to take on a new direction and highlight its diversity”.

On Tuesday, Bersatu associate wing chief Chong Fat Full expressed hope that the non-Bumiputera members would be allowed to vote for the party’s top five leaders at the party elections.

While only the three vice-president’s posts are being contested, Chong said, allowing non-Bumiputera members to vote would give them equal treatment in the party.

The associate wing was formally established in 2021 in hopes of attracting non-Malay support. However, its members can only contest for posts within the wing.

Bersatu has struggled to garner non-Malay support since leaving Pakatan Harapan and allying with PAS under PN.

PAS also has little non-Malay support but now permits non-Muslims to become associate members, although analysts have played this down as an insincere and impractical move since they would not have equal voting rights.