Pakatan Harapan (PH)
## Established facts
membership is temporal
Who is in it
Currently: PKR, DAP, AMANAH.
Previously, and no longer: BERSATU, UPKO.
Party membership of a coalition changes over time. The dates behind this are the same ones the Coalition River on the home page is drawn from.
the account
Pakatan Harapan is Malaysia's current governing coalition — but it's actually the second attempt at this exact coalition. The first version, Pakatan Rakyat, fell apart in 2015 after its component parties couldn't agree on issues including the role of Islamic law. Three of those parties — PKR, DAP, and a brand-new party called Amanah (formed by moderates who'd just left PAS) — regrouped almost immediately, launching Pakatan Harapan in September 2015.
For its first couple of years, PH was an opposition coalition trying to find a way to beat Barisan Nasional (BN), the coalition that had ruled Malaysia without interruption since independence. The big move came in 2017: Mahathir Mohamad — Malaysia's former long-serving Prime Minister, and by then a fierce critic of BN — brought his new party, Bersatu, into PH. It was a strange alliance on paper: the reformist, DAP-anchored coalition now included a former authoritarian-era leader. But it worked. In the 2018 general election, PH pulled off what once seemed impossible, winning 113 of 222 parliamentary seats and ending BN's 61-year rule. Mahathir became Prime Minister again, this time under a Harapan banner, with an understanding — agreed by PH's leaders in January 2018 — that he'd eventually hand power to PKR's Anwar Ibrahim.
That handover never happened on schedule, and the friction it created helped bring the government down. In February 2020, in an episode known as the "Sheraton Move," Bersatu MPs and a breakaway PKR faction withdrew their support for the government. Mahathir resigned, Bersatu formally quit PH the same day, and Malaysia got a new Prime Minister — Muhyiddin Yassin — from a completely different coalition. PH was back in opposition after less than two years in power. Anwar took over as PH's chairman shortly after.
PH spent the next couple of years rebuilding, including bringing in a new Sabah party, UPKO, in 2021, and striking an electoral pact (short of full membership) with the youth-oriented party MUDA. Then came the 2022 general election, which produced Malaysia's first hung parliament: PH won the most seats of any coalition (82) but not a majority. After days of uncertainty, the King intervened, and Anwar Ibrahim was finally appointed Prime Minister in November 2022 — heading not a pure PH government, but a broader "unity government" that also includes BN, several East Malaysian coalitions, and other allies.
PH today is a smaller coalition than at its 2018 peak: after UPKO split off in November 2025, citing disputes over Sabah's rights within the federation, PH is back down to its three founding parties — PKR, DAP, and Amanah — even as Anwar continues to govern through the wider unity-government arrangement. The 2026 Johor and Negeri Sembilan elections also showed that this federal cooperation is not a uniform electoral alliance: PH and BN ran against each other in Johor, while BN emerged as the largest bloc in Negeri Sembilan. Understanding PH means understanding that "PH" and "the government Anwar leads" are related but not identical things — the coalition itself has shrunk and grown several times since 2015, and today's governing majority depends on parties well outside PH's own membership.
the working
What the sources say
established
Pakatan Harapan (PH, "Alliance of Hope") was formed on 22 September 2015 by three parties — PKR (People's Justice Party), DAP (Democratic Action Party), and the newly established Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah) — as a successor pact to Pakatan Rakyat (PR), which had formally dissolved on 16 June 2015.
established
PR's collapse followed a split between PAS and DAP; Amanah was founded by moderate PAS figures who left that party after rejecting its hudud (Islamic criminal law) push and exclusivist direction, and Amanah became one of PH's three founding members in place of PAS.
established
Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM/Bersatu), led by Mahathir Mohamad and Muhyiddin Yassin, signed a seven-point cooperation agreement with PH parties on 13 December 2016 and was formally admitted as PH's fourth component party on 20 March 2017 at a PH presidential council meeting.
established
PH describes its own platform as centred on institutional reform, anti-corruption, and "multiracial" representation; its 2018 general election manifesto ("Buku Harapan") set out 60 promises, including 10 flagged for delivery within the first 100 days of government, most prominently abolition of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).
contested
Scholars have characterised PH as a multiracial, urban-leaning reform coalition positioned centre to centre-left, built around the 1998 Reformasi tradition of PKR; some academic accounts have also described the coalition as containing "populist, welfarist, reformist and racialist" internal tensions that complicated its reformist self-image. (characterisation, attributed)
established
In the 9 May 2018 general election (GE14), PH — then including Bersatu — won 113 of 222 parliamentary seats, ending the Barisan Nasional coalition's unbroken rule since independence in 1957. Its component parties won PKR 47 seats, DAP 42, Bersatu 13, and Amanah 11. Mahathir Mohamad was sworn in as the 7th Prime Minister.
established
At a PH presidential council meeting on 6 January 2018, the coalition's leaders agreed that Anwar Ibrahim would be appointed as the country's next prime minister following Mahathir, as part of the pre-election arrangement; no fixed handover date was specified at that time.
established
Mahathir Mohamad served as PH chairman from 14 July 2017 to 24 February 2020, when he resigned as Prime Minister amid the "Sheraton Move" political crisis. Wan Azizah Wan Ismail (PKR) has held the position of PH president since 14 July 2017.
established
On 23–24 February 2020, Bersatu MPs led by Muhyiddin Yassin and a bloc of PKR MPs aligned with then-Deputy Prime Minister Azmin Ali withdrew support from the PH government (the "Sheraton Move"). Mahathir resigned as Prime Minister on 24 February 2020, and Bersatu formally exited PH the same day, leaving the coalition short of a parliamentary majority. Muhyiddin Yassin was subsequently appointed Prime Minister, heading a new Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition of Bersatu, BN, PAS and allied parties.
established
Anwar Ibrahim has served as PH chairman since 2020 (formalised by mid-May 2020, after the coalition backed him as its choice for prime minister following the Sheraton Move).
established
The Sabah-based United Progressive Kinabalu Organisation (UPKO) left Barisan Nasional after GE14 (2018) and cooperated informally with PH and Warisan in the Sabah state government, but did not formally become a PH component party at that time. UPKO's application for full PH membership was accepted at a PH presidential council meeting on 26 August 2021, making it PH's fourth component party at that point (alongside PKR, DAP, Amanah).
established
In the completed GE15 contests, PH won 82 of 222 seats — the largest single-coalition total but short of a majority — followed by Perikatan Nasional (PN) with 74, Barisan Nasional (BN) with 30, Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) with 23, Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) with six and Warisan with three.
established
Following the hung parliament, and after the Yang di-Pertuan Agong asked parties and coalitions to consider a unity government, Anwar Ibrahim was appointed Malaysia's 10th Prime Minister on 24 November 2022. PH, BN and GPS initially agreed to support the government; it subsequently included GRS and Warisan as well.
Prime Minister's Office of Malaysia · Prime Minister's Office of Malaysia
established
PH has an electoral cooperation pact with the Malaysian United Democratic Alliance (MUDA), but MUDA has never been a registered PH component party. PH's presidential council approved a seat-sharing/electoral pact with MUDA (and, separately, PSM) in October 2022 while explicitly stopping short of admitting MUDA as a member — full membership would additionally have required Registrar of Societies approval. MUDA MPs supported the PH-led unity government formed after GE15.
established
UPKO formally severed ties with PH on 10 November 2025, on the eve of the 17th Sabah state election, citing disputes with national PH leadership over the interpretation of Sabah's constitutional 40% revenue entitlement and a perceived lack of autonomy for PH Sabah; the move followed UPKO president Ewon Benedick's resignation as a federal cabinet minister the same week. This left PKR, DAP, and Amanah as PH's only remaining component parties.
established
As of this writing (2026), PH's component parties are PKR, DAP, and Amanah; Anwar Ibrahim remains PH chairman and Prime Minister.
established
The July–August 2026 state elections did not use a single federal-unity-government electoral arrangement. In Johor on 11 July, BN and PH each contested all 56 seats; BN won 48 and PH eight. In Negeri Sembilan on 1 August, BN won 18 of 36 seats, PH 11 and PN seven, so PH no longer led the state government.
contested
Critics, including opposition politicians before GE14, described PH's 2018 manifesto commitments (e.g., abolishing GST, targeted fuel subsidies, various cost-of-living pledges) as unrealistic given the fiscal position PH would inherit; the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (IDEAS), a Malaysian think tank, later published an assessment identifying specific manifesto promises it judged unrealistic. (attributed assessment)
contested
After taking office, Mahathir Mohamad himself stated that some manifesto promises were made without an expectation that PH would win. Analysts commenting on PH's November 2019 Tanjung Piai by-election defeat cited unfulfilled manifesto promises among the factors they considered. (self-characterisation by a PH leader, plus attributed analysis)
contested
The unresolved Mahathir-to-Anwar power transfer promised in the GE14-era agreement (per the 6 January 2018 presidential council decision) became a persistent point of internal tension through 2018–2020, with disputes over timing, and with tension between Anwar and then-Deputy Prime Minister Azmin Ali (PKR) over pace of transition and cabinet positioning; this internal conflict is widely cited by scholars and journalists as a contributing factor to the coalition's collapse in the Sheraton Move. (multiple accounts differ on responsibility/sequence)
contested
Former PH chairman Muhyiddin Yassin later stated that Mahathir Mohamad had initiated Bersatu's planned exit from PH before the Sheraton Move but changed his mind at the last minute; this account has been disputed by other figures involved and is not independently confirmed., single-source attributed account
where accounts differ
The parts nobody agrees on
contested
Sources differ on how precisely to characterise UPKO's 2018–2021 relationship with PH: some retrospective summaries loosely describe UPKO as having been "part of" the Sabah PH-Warisan government from 2018, while contemporaneous and formal-membership sources are clear that UPKO's *formal* admission as a PH component party did not occur until 26 August 2021. This page uses the formal membership date. (terminology, not underlying fact)
contested
The precise internal sequence and motives behind the Sheraton Move — including who initiated it and what individual leaders knew in advance — remain disputed among participants' later accounts. For example, Muhyiddin later said Mahathir had initiated a planned Bersatu exit, an account other figures disputed; this page does not treat any individual account of foreknowledge as established. (attributed, conflicting accounts)
established
MUDA's status is sometimes loosely reported in casual commentary as PH "membership," which this page treats as imprecise; formal sourcing indicates an electoral/seat-sharing pact and unity-government cooperation, not registered component-party status. Because MUDA was never a formal member, it is excluded from the structured `membership` list above (a member/ally distinction, not an omission).