This lecture looks at the reverberations of China’s impact in Malaysia before and after the groundbreaking 14^th General Election on 9 May 2018. China´s growing influence over the Southeast Asian nation during the premiership of Najib Razak (2009-18) became a contentious issue. Combined with Najib’s scandals and incompetence, these factors enabled the oppositional Pakatan Harapan coalition to defeat the Barisan Nasional after 63 years in power. The reset in China-Malaysia economic relations that Mahathir announced shook Chinese leaders´ confidence, making them launch a diplomatic initiative to maintain their “cautiously friendly ties”. While Mahathir kept presenting himself as a friend and admirer of China, he insisted on preventing Malaysia from falling into China´s “debt trap”. He called for a revision or scrapping of big Chinese projects, arguing Malaysia cannot afford them. His strong stance secured more reasonable conditions for some of the plans and attempted to curb the intensifying grip of Asia’s giant over his country, largely implemented via the grand scheme of the Belt and Road Initiative. However, in February 2020 Mahathir lost his job as PM in an unprecedented power gamble, and a new government of Muhyiddin Yassin was ushered in. At roughly the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic started spreading, setting different priorities of both countries, putting on hold many of the BRI plans. While China remains the biggest foreign investor in Malaysia, another looming question is how “soft power” tools such as China´s cultural diplomacy will be applied to enhance Chinese influence, while winning “hearts and minds” of Malaysians.