Mahathir: I am a threat to the nation in Najib’s Malaysia

Predicting more efforts will be made to demonise him and pin the blame on him for ‘crimes’ during his term as prime minister, the PPBM chairman warns of more instances of thuggery ahead.

KUALA LUMPUR: Saying he is now considered a threat to the nation, Dr Mahathir Mohamad predicts more instances of thuggery.

The PPBM chairman also said, in his latest blogpost, that it did not make sense to blame the fracas at the Nothing to Hide 2 forum on PPBM members, and that police could easily identify the troublemakers by viewing the videos of the recent incident.

The former prime minister also urged the police to be fair in investigating the fracas.

“We seem to have entered into a new phase in the effort of (Prime Minister) Najib Razak’s supporters to ensure there would be no opposition to his continued premiership of this nation.”

He said a group of young people stopped the forum by acts of violence and that Umno leaders, who were not present, were quick to claim that the thugs were members of Armada, the organisers of the forum.

“If they were, why should they riot when it was clear that the forum was not going in Najib’s favour. They rioted when their questions did not elicit answers in his favour either. Clearly they rioted to stop the forum, to protect Najib.”

Since they were “obviously pro-Najib” and were “trying “unsuccessfully” to embarrass him, Mahathir concluded they could not be from PPBM.

Umno leaders could deny that “these hooligans” were from Umno, “but the fact remains that they are supporters of Najib, who is the president of Umno,” he charged.

Mahathir said while the police were free to question the organisers, Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar should not use threatening language against them – “language that imply the organisers are guilty of not complying with police conditions”.

He said the police could call in the organisers if they suspected that the organisers were involved in any wrongdoing, but the police must hear their side of the story, too.

Mahathir added: “The riots were fully captured on video. The rioters’ faces will help to identify who the rioters were and what they did.

“It looks like more thuggery is in store for Malaysians. We now get a report that Hindraf leader P Waythamoorthy has been assaulted and threatened by a knife-wielding thug for not supporting the government.”

Mahathir was referring to reports that two men had assaulted Waythamoorthy at his office on Aug 16 and warned him “not to mess around with the government” before he met Mahathir for talks of a possible partnership against the Barisan Nasional in the next general election.

Mahathir said: “This is Najib’s Malaysia. People are no longer safe and secure. I am now a threat to the nation. So look back over three decades and resurrect the crimes that can be blamed on me. If this fails to achieve the objective to demonise me, then we will be seeing more violence.”

He was obviously referring to the just-started royal commission of inquiry into Bank Negara’s forex loses in the 1980s and 1990s when he was prime minister, and talk of a possible RCI on the Memali incident in which 18 people died in Baling in 1985, also under his watch. - FMT