Malaysia's Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Badawi seems to have survived the worst of the campaign against his regime that his predecessor Tun Dr Mahathir started a good many months ago.

Although Malaysian politics herald more twists and turns than anyone can predict, the signs suggest that Tun Dr Mahathir is running out of steam and options. Once UMNO's upper echelons had closed ranks against him, the battle could not be won. He is now caught in the equivalent of the "snipe and retreat" stage, and is left claiming small victories wherever possible.

His claim to support and sympathy is no longer made as if by a patriot rallying against bad governance, but by a victim attempting to maximise wrongs done to him personally.

However, the fact that he will not give up poses a serious problem for the government. Beating back Mahathir's siege is one thing, but overrunning his final positions would be an act of overkill that would hurt the moral standing of the regime.

More seriously, the can of worms punctured by Mahathir, and then inadvertently pried opened by the haphazard and disorganized way in which Abdullah's troops responded to the challenge cannot possibly be closed again.

The biggest long-lived worms released over the last few months stem from two related factors – Abdullah's weak leadership, and the general inability to answer questions about the business dealings of his son and his son-in-law. Even as Mahathir snipes, Abdullah finds himself running around trying to control the damage done.

Abdullah may be ahead in the battle with Mahathir for the moment, but this achievement has not been the moral one that it could have been. He has basically managed to repel the former premier's attack through the sheer power of incumbency. The Ninth Malaysia Plan and the national budget provided him with means by which he could show leadership and through which he could exercise patronage vis-a-vis various groups.

In the meantime, reform measures such as the setting up of the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC) have been put off, if not shelved for good.

Under pressure from Tun Dr Mahathir, Datuk Seri Abdullah had otherwise shown an inability to multitask. In order to concentrate, he expressed the wish that discussions about religious rights be stopped for the time being; this was eagerly and happily carried out by the lower ranks of the civil service and others. Instead of getting to the bottom of things, he merely called for the escalating altercation between MPs and the Customs and Excise Department to cease.

What these and other issues amount to, is an "acid test", as some analysts call it, of Abdullah's will and ability to fight corruption in high places.

The premier has also had to backtrack on his earlier claim that his son Kamaluddin's company Scomi had little dealing within the country, while his advice to Khairy Jamaluddin, his son-in-law, to explain his remark that the Chinese would take advantage of any disunity within UMNO has so far gone unheeded.

Thanks to Khairy, he is now caught in a diplomatic challenge over how Gerakan, a major partner in the ruling coalition, has been governing the Chinese-majority state of Penang and whether or not that party had been neglecting Malays in the state.

The inter-racial factor involved seems very much out of place in the larger context of the intra-Umno conflict started by Tun Dr Mahathir. This quickly led to accusations that political opportunism was being practiced far too frivolously.

This is hardly what a premier under pressure needs at the moment.

Other UMNO leaders such as Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak and Education Minister Hishammuddin Hussein have felt it necessary to risk revealing cracks in the leadership, and have indirectly admonished Khairy over the matter.

The seriousness of the matter is reflected in the fact that coalition partners such as Gerakan and the MCA, who would usually be pacified at the slightest nudge, are not letting go of the matter. Even the oppositional DAP has expressed support for them.

The national budget recently revealed show signs of being an "election budget". If there is any truth to the rumour now circulating in Kuala Lumpur that general elections will be called next year, then Datuk Seri Abdullah will need to multitask more than ever before in order to curb the resurgent opposition parties.

He will need to show leadership and stake a clear direction for Malaysians to follow, not only for the sake of economic development, but more importantly, to remind them of the supremacy of the rule of law and the sanctity of individual rights.