Bumiputera Malaysia

Bumiputera Malaysia

By a Malaysian for his country

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Mahathir grilled Abdullah on last "buka puasa"

Former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad grilled PM Abdullah on the last day of the holy Ramadan month, just a couple of hours before the last "buka puasa" or break fast dinner began.

On the economy: The economy is doing badly. There is no foreign direct investment coming in now. Some Chinese business people came to see me and told me that they will not vote for Barisan Nasional in the next general election and will instead vote for the opposition.

On the PM's honesty: How does he get involved with the United Nations Iraq Oil-For-Food business? He says he is not involved but his name is there as a beneficiary. As far as I am concerned, you should not write letters of recommendation for your own relative.

On Zakaria's illegal mansion in Klang: As soon as the controversy blew up, he lost his temper and wanted to saman (fine) RM45,000. Then he left for umrah together with Zakaria and Zakaria was his tour leader, then came back to Malaysia and asked for RM24,000. I can tell you that he had actually visited the house because the house had been there for 3 years already. Here is a palace stuck in a poverty stricken area but he did not make a comment. He makes a comment because this time the public knows.


Zakaria was the tour leader for Abdullah's overseas trip

On Malaysia being a police state: The public is very critical of the present condition of the economy, the present system of administration, the involvement of family members, telephone calls,
contracts won by his children’s company.

On Rafidah and AP: It was wrong to give (AP) to two friends of Rafidah and this constitutes abuse of authority by the Minister.

On Proton: Few years back, Proton made RM1.5 billion ringgit profit. Now, it is losing money. He has destroyed Proton.

On Bumiputera's equity: Let’s clear this up. For every criticism directed at the government, the answer is "
don’t question this thing", "don’t raise this issue", "stop talking about this".

On Khairy Jamaluddin: This is someone who had just joined UMNO and who had not shown any (bakti) to Umno but won without contest and there were messages through the telephone that everyone had to vote.

On his isolation: The Menteri Besar will come and give warning. Tengku Razaleigh said Annuar Musa said “I will make sure he does not speak”. I don’t know what “making sure” means but what actually happened is that when I went there, I wasn’t allowed to speak.