This paper offers an in-depth political analysis of the rhetoric and the speech of Mohammad Najib Abdul

Razak, the 6th and Prime Minister of Malaysia, between 2010 and 2015. Utilizing a qualitative cross-sectional

exploratory design within a theory developed by Halliday and Hasan, this study analyzes the political

narratives of Najib as performative texts. The focus of this analysis is to determine the political words and

rhetorical strategies Najib used in the ethnically diverse and politically complicated Malaysia. The analysis

crafted political technology that, instead of solving, kept a lid on the basic tensions of the Malaysian society.

His eventual political demise, then, is to be taken as marking not the defeat of this rhetorical model, but rather

the most profound fracture of the fragile balance that model was intended to preserve. This dissertation offers a

new perspective on the intersection of political linguistics and Malaysian Studies by demonstrating how, in a

critical period of the country’s history, language was deployed as a key instrument of power.

Malay Hegemony.

Politics is a struggle for power in order to put certain political, economic and social ideas into practice.

Political leaders use language to convey their messages, shape public opinion, and mobilize support for their

focuses on the fusion of political science, discourse analysis, and linguistic studies to systematically investigate

the political speech of Mohammad Najib Abdul Razak as the sixth premier of Malaysia between 2009 and

2018, a time of immense political change and unrest in the country.

The importance of this inquiry has several elements. In the field of political communication and the less

documented phenomenon of the Malay language, the scholarly construct termed the Language Planning Model

(LPM) comes to dominate language planning issues in Malaysia. In sharp contrast to LPM, this new model has

become the focus of heightened academic interest and analyses, including the rational reconstruction of the

intricate rhetoric, strategies, and language of Najib in the last decade, with particular emphasis on the party

manifesto speeches delivered during the last two general elections which were heavily contested. This work of

academic inquiry strongly contends that post-1999 prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi attempted to

instrumental in the nation's goal to accomplish progress, raises the critical concern of whether policies were

actually for the uplifting of the country or purely for political narcissism. The utterances and public speeches

of Mohammad Najib Abdul Razak (2009-2018) are yet to be comprehensively analyzed from the political lens

of interdisciplinary politics covering linguistics, discourse, and polity. Thus, it is in this regard that the

complete assessment of Najib's term from the point of view of rhetoric and language is likely to shed new

light, not just on the rhetoric and language of Najib, but also enhance the understanding of the usage of

language in Malaysian politics, in turn, addressing the wider theoretical issues of political discourse in a

fractured society.

Political Malaysia has language and other characteristics that reflect its complex and pluralistic society of

Malays, Indonesians, Chinese, and Indians. Politics in Malaysia is dominated by three intersections: race,

policy, good governance, national unity, and economic policy. Each of these periods is dominated by specific

rhetorical approaches to fundamental issues, like education policy, good governance, national unity, and

economic policy.

Of particular interest to me is Najib's background and political ancestry which makes him worthy of scholarly

analysis and critique. Najib's father, especially being the second Prime Minister of the country, as well as the

very first indigenous MAHA President, Dato Haji Abdul Razak bin Dato Hussein, was of extreme stature.

Moreover, being born in the year 1953 in Kuala Lipis, Pahang, gives him the edge of old age wisdom. This is

alongside the fact that our country is currently structured as a multi-ethnic society dominated by the Malays.

This makes him a focal point for examining political language for our age. His father being such a great

individual certainly paved the way for him. Receiving education from the finest institutions such as St John's

what is referred to as the “democratic senile” condition placed on him as a speaker (Abadi, 2021).

This analysis approaches Malaysia's background as a multicultural state with fascinatingly complicated

policies from the lens of its deep plurality. Still, the ethnic plurality has not always worked as an advantage for

the Malaysian society, due to the constant tendency to conflict and to unevenly developed patterns of conflict

many communities still maintain (Lean LIM, 2021). This paper discusses the concept of language levels to

“read” Najib’s language with the more advanced and delicate profiling. It does not suggest, of course, that this

approach covers the entire spectrum of Najib's political language, but rather, it narrows its focus toward the

linguistic-style framework of his political communication. This investigation applies the Empirical Concept

Analysis (ECA) framework as the primary systematic approach for coding and interpreting his rhetorical

moves.

Politicians are often aware of the value of using rhetorical devices in evoking applause to elicit agreement from

their audience. As such, applause can be interpreted as a highly noticeable expression of group identity or

solidarity with the speaker and the party the speaker represents. Therefore, the importance of rhetorical

speeches.

The sixth Prime Minister of Malaysia, Mohammad Najib Abdul Razak, epitomized controversy amid

numerous speculative and unfounded allegations associated with numerous political scandals. Nevertheless,

his tenacity and experience in the political battlefield allowed him to withstand the barrage of controversies,

retaining his influence and power for a considerable time.

Ironically, for all the developments and policies he pursued, he faced an abrupt loss to his erstwhile benefactor,

Analyzing political speeches requires the constituent facets of multiple disciplines, especially within the

context of the socio-political environment within Malaysia. The case study of Prime Minister Mohammad

Najib Abdul Razak provides the needed setting for this inquiry. The analysis proceeds within scholarly

frameworks constructed from a number of interrelated pillars, starting with political linguistics and the

are treated as performed texts, the ‘grammatical’ configurations of which are interrogated in order to expose

ideologies and persuasive techniques that underpin the texts (Simanjuntak et al., 2023). These texts are

rhetorical questioning, and hedging, which enabled him of sidestepping rather controversial matters while

keeping the illusion of civility and non-aggressive interaction (Hariyanto, 2023; Alhamidi et al., 2021). The

use of intentional vagueness, especially the repeated use of the pronoun “we”, served to create and sustain

political fog and communicative mediocrity (Hariyanto, 2023). It suggests that Najib developed a more

chilling version of political discourse that remained courteous, yet uncomfortable. Such descriptions

figuratively carded as ‘politeness theory’ has been highlighted by Susanto (2018) while analysing the manner

in which Racism and other bigoted expressions can be linguistically sanitized through a discipline of decency.

As previously exemplified, linguistic issues cannot be separated from the issues of language policies and

identity within the nation of Malaysia. The post-independence nation-building project was arguably anchored

in the institutionalization of Bahasa Malaysia as the nation’s lingua franca. This was accomplished, arguably,

through the clinching of the National Language Act of 1967, which sought to construct a national identity from

initiatives serves to reinforce Malaysia’s dominant symbol of identity as a Malay nation, and to a lesser extent,

Of all the features that characterize communication in the Malaysian polity, of central interest, and most

articulated, is the discourse on and of race and ethnicity. Tambiah (2023) asserts that in Malaysia race is

organized and negotiated. The essence of Malay supremacy and the responsibility to defend ketuanan Melayu

(Malay dominance) is a surreptitious and deeply historical current in a policy constellation that includes the

New Economic Policy (NEP). It is, then, important to place the rhetoric of Najib in this context. Some

scholars, like Abadi (2021) argue that Najib, unlike his predecessor, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who advocated

construction of a narrative of entitlement and ethnic vulnerability protected by a particular electoral base.The

media and institutional frameworks in developing and sharing this rhetoric remain to be studied critically.

While the media passes portray information and formulate models, their role is not limited to being passive

Hasim, 2009; Chavez, 2023 ). Therefore covering the role of the media is double-edged, as media can either be

a instrument of development, or as the text states, a "weapon that bites back its master." in the context

comparatively of the themes of the text (Birhane et al 2022) concerning in the relations of race, and

the institutional process of translation is done. His speeches being translated and official done by the state

sponsored the Institute of Language and Publication lectures adds a layer of mediation and possibly

sampled reports. To conduct this cross-sectional exploratory case study, seven reports were exhaustively

documented and analyzed. The reports are the utterances of Najib from 2010 to 2015. The intention was to