Recent political developments in Malaysia suggest that the reverberations from the March 8 electoral earthquake are still strong.

The decision of Umno president Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to expedite the transfer of power to his deputy, Najib Abdul Razak, is perhaps one of the more significant of those reverberations. Umno and its coalition partners in the Barisan Nasional had suffered an unprecedented setback in the 12th General Election.

The BN not only lost its two-third majority in the federal parliament for the first time in history but was also ousted as the ruling party in four states - Kedah, Penang, Perak and Selangor - besides failing yet again to regain control of Kelantan.

After such a colossal debacle, it was not surprising that many people expected Abdullah to assume full responsibility for the ignominious performance and to quit gracefully as Umno president, BN leader and prime minister