Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak has fired an intercontinental salvo against his former mentor-turned-foe Dr Mahathir Mohamad.
Speaking to reporters in London, he commented on the former premier’s remarks of preventing BN from winning in the upcoming by-elections, which is seen as a stab in the back.
Najib noted how during his 22-year tenure as prime minister, BN and Umno had helped Mahathir and his family reap enormous benefits.
“He and his family had derived a lot of benefits from his position as PM which was due to the strength of Umno and BN.
“So, when he told the people to reject the party which had done a lot, there were negative reactions against his stand because without BN and Umno, he would not have become prime minister or even a minister,” he was quoted as saying by Bernama.
Najib was asked to comment on Mahathir’s statement which called on opposition parties to be united against BN in the Kuala Kangsar and Sungai Besar by-elections on June 18.
The only press who heard all this guff was Najib’s paid for pet media from Malaysia. He could much more cheaply have spoken to them back home.
The UK press was barred from attending all his events, which given these were all private and not sanctioned by the UK Government, it was possible for him to do.
As, for example, Channel 4 News made clear, the reason for this was obvious, which is that the Malaysian Prime Minister dare not take questions from the free British media, which does not fear to ask the questions people actually want answers to.
Like, since the Auditor General has concluded in his report that US$7 billion has disappeared from 1MDB (which was directly under your control) why have you made his report an official secret and announced that it is “too early to conclude fraud” at 1MDB?
And why have you failed to call in the police to investigate?