Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia

Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia (PGRM) was founded on 24 March 1968 as an independent party. It won the general election the following year and ruled the Penang State for the next 40 years (1969 – 2008). After successfully forming a state government in 1969 general elections, Gerakan was invited by Tun Abdul Razak, the second prime minister of Malaysia, to join the national ruling coalition, the Alliance Party, which formed the federal government.

In 1972, Gerakan joined the Alliance and inspired the formation of Barisan Nasional. On 23 June 2018, Gerakan left Barisan Nasional and became an independent political party. On 11 February 2021, Gerakan was officially accepted as a component party to the new political coalition, Parti Perikatan Nasional. Gerakan has been committed to the pursuit of a non-ethnic approach as the basis of its political struggle, be it in politics, economics, education, and culture. Since its founding in 1968, Party Gerakan has never relented, and will never relent, in the party struggle for a truly Malaysian nonracial approach toward the attainment of a united, secular, and socially just Malaysia, though the forms and modes of struggle can vary according to changing circumstances.

This was the line of the party’s founding fathers. It remains the party’s line today. It will be the party’s line tomorrow. This consistency and steadfastness in the party’s commitment to the non-ethnic approach are premised on the belief that there is a large section of the society who are not ethnic Malay, but whose political consciousness is Malaysian, and want political representation as Malaysians.