Mahathir’s Final Legacies

As the component parties of Perikatan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan attempt to work towards setting aside their own aspirations and differences to face GE15 – a constant remains, Mahathir and his party of hangers-on.

This time, this may be the final attempt for the former PM to cement his standing in Malaysia’s history before he dies.

The irony shines brighter than ever given the multiple mismanagement that happened during the reign of the 4th and 7th Prime Minister - where Malaysians saw assets and companies being stripped for the benefit of the few such as Tun Daim Zainuddin and his boys, culminating in an era of crony capitalism, with its ripple effects still being felt today.

It is unfortunate that social media did not exist back then to form the proper check and balance against the government of the day, which controlled nearly all of the media outlets accessible to the public, but luckily for us and the younger Malaysians, we finally know the true nature of Tun Dr Mahathir.

Tun Dr Mahathir’s return to the political arena was exhilarating to many without a doubt, which led to Pakatan Harapan winning Putrajaya for the first time. However, the Malaysia Baru days saw many shades of the same old colour through an increase in privatisation of government assets and even vanity projects such as a third national car.

Not only that, we also witnessed Tun Dr Mahathir’s inability to work with many of his component party members, which led to the demise of the Pakatan Harapan government. We all know for sure now that it has been a game of ego for the old man, and will continue to be one if we let things slide back to where it were.

Let us hope that things are different this time around.

Despite the legacy he has built for himself over the course of more than 22 years and 22 months, there were not much fanfare this time around. While many Bersatu chapters dismantled themselves to align with the new party - these chapters were barebone skeleton crews anyways.

Not only that, popular figures aligned with Tun Dr Mahathir such as Syed Saddiq has yet to come out and announce their full support (not really a loss considering the latter’s subpar performance as the Minister of Youth and Sports and his political naïveté). Not a popular thing to do of course, when the new party will be led by Tun Dr Mahathir and his son, Mukhriz, while maintaining its distance with the Opposition’s largest block Pakatan Harapan.

This goes to show that the rakyat is generally sick and tired of the “statesman”. Again and again he has demonstrated to all that he will do whatever it takes to secure the future of his children, most notably the bumbling Mukhriz Mahathir who managed to lose the Kedah Mentri Besar seat twice. An admirable trait, no doubt, but not when it has tangible effects on the people of Malaysia.

After all it was opposition (now Mahathir ally) leader Lim Kit Siang who stated that, that it was during Mahathir’s 22-year tenure as prime minister that Malaysia first began to “rot”, thanks to corruption and rampant power abuse.

He pointed out that it was during Mahathir who had “single-handedly destroyed the independence, impartiality and professionalism not only of the judiciary, but also of other important national institutions like the police, the Election Commission, the anti-corruption agency, and the civil service”.

All talks of restoring the Malay dignity aside, this new party fights for nothing but the Mahathir legacy, and the sooner the rakyat realises that, the better.