The Malaysian Insight

ANWAR Ibrahim will not be a good prime minister for Malaysia as he may not be able to navigate the country out of a financial crisis, said Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

The former prime minister said this was evident in 1997 when he allowed Anwar, then his deputy, to handle the Asian financial crisis for two months, while he went on a sabbatical.

“I have tested his capabilities when I was prime minister. I took a holiday for two months and Anwar took over the reins. We had an economic crisis at the time, and his suggestions did not help the country recover its financial standings.

“That is why I had to take over from the finance minister and come up with plans to save the country from economic woes.

“I do not know how the people saw this, but what was clear during the financial crisis in 1997 was, Anwar was not capable,” Dr Mahathir told The Malaysian Insight.

Anwar, who was finance minister in Mahathir’s cabinet at the height of the currency crisis, was sacked in 1998.

The two were widely reported to have fallen out over differences in handling the economy. Anwar had then welcomed a rescue package by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which Dr Mahathir rejected.

The Langkawi MP claimed Anwar had blindly followed the advice of the IMF and World Bank instead of prioritising Malaysia’s economy.

“He always followed the World Bank and IMF. I told him before if we followed their suggestions, our country would not have enough funds to even pay salaries. But he continued supporting them,” he said.

When Dr Mahathir returned to office, he reversed several of Anwar’s decisions and launched a policy package to insulate Malaysia from external forces, including pegging the ringgit against the US dollar.

Malaysia was hailed globally for leading the strongest recovery among the nations badly affected by the economic crisis.

Dr Mahathir also revealed Anwar currently did not include him or his new party, Pejuang, in attempts to overthrow the Perikatan Nasional government.

“Even though Bersatu has left Pakatan Harapan (PH), a few others and I are still willing to work with PH to return the mandate to the people.

“We can get a majority but Anwar has refused to work together with us – me especially.

“If he rejects me, then I cannot invite others to support PH as well to get a majority. That is why we are not in government,” Dr Mahathir said.

However, the Pejuang chairman said there might be supporters outside, and even in the Dewan Rakyat, who would not support Anwar despite him agreeing to it.

“I suspect if I promise he becomes the prime minister, a lot of my very own supporters will reject the idea. Maybe that would lead to not having any majority at all,” he said.

Anwar, who is opposition leader, previously claimed he has the majority to form government but is still waiting for the palace to have an audience with other political party leaders to confirm his numbers.

The PKR president claimed he had a strong and formidable majority to overthrow Muhyiddin Yassin’s government.

Despite that, Dr Mahathir remains unconvinced and is worried Anwar might be delusional.

“He is still not prime minister today even though he claimed several times he is going to be.

“There have been preparations made for him to be sworn in but alas that did not happen,” the former prime minister added. – November 14, 2020.