Hamzah Zainudin

Biography

Hamzah bin Zainudin (born 12 March 1957 in Perak) is the Leader of the Opposition in the Dewan Rakyat and has been the Member of Parliament for Larut since 2008. He returned to the opposition leadership in June 2026 after founding a new party, Parti Wawasan Negara, having previously held the post from December 2022 until his resignation in April 2026. Hamzah was educated at Sekolah Tuanku Abdul Rahman and took a diploma in quantity surveying at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia in 1975, working in business before entering politics. He sat in the Senate before winning Larut at the 2008 general election, and served continuously in Barisan Nasional governments under Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and Najib Razak — as deputy minister for housing and local government, plantation industries and commodities, and foreign affairs, and later as Minister of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism — until the coalition's defeat in 2018. He left UMNO for the Malaysian United Indigenous Party (BERSATU) in December 2018. When the Pakatan Harapan government fell in February 2020, Hamzah was appointed Home Minister by Muhyiddin Yassin and kept the portfolio under Ismail Sabri Yaakob, holding it until November 2022. He was BERSATU's secretary-general from 2020 and later its deputy president. After the 2022 general election he became Leader of the Opposition at the head of Perikatan Nasional. In February 2026 BERSATU's disciplinary board expelled him along with sixteen other members, including Wan Ahmad Fayhsal, over alleged party violations — a rupture that set off an internal crisis in the party. He launched Parti Wawasan Negara in June 2026 and was reappointed Leader of the Opposition.

Constituencies (1)

Electoral track record

395 mentions across 6 months

News mentions