|
|
|
|
| World |
| Malaysia ruling party plans retirement gift for PM |
|
by
Simon Cameron-Moore, Reuters , 20 June 2003
-
12:57:44
|
Malaysia’s Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, leaving office this year after decades of rubbing the West the wrong way, is getting a personalised retirement present from his followers — his very own think-tank.
On Thursday, the 77-year old Southeast Asian Muslim leader again served up his essentially anti-Western world view for an adoring audience at his United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) annual party conference.
Soon after he sat down, senior party figures rushed to back proposals to set up a “Dr Mahathir Mohamad Institute of Strategic Thinking” once he retires at the end of October.
“Since he is a great leader who is more advanced in his thinking than his people, it is timely that we set up such a centre,” Mustapa Mohamed, an UMNO luminary, told the conference in a motion of thanks.
Mahathir choked up with tears as he thanked Allah for having given him the opportunity to contribute to society as an “insignificant slave”.
Asked later about his retirement plans, the veteran premier, who critics call authoritarian, was all humility.
“After my retirement...I don’t play much role. Don’t know what I can do. I’m a nobody,” Mahathir told reporters.
Mahathir has repeatedly stated that he does not wish to play any kind of senior minister role to his successor, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, but there is little chance of him staying quiet.
His favourite targets include Europe’s history of violent conquest, the risks of re-colonisation through globalisation, and the moral flaws of Western liberal democracies.
The former medical doctor regularly prescribes ideas for alternative economic systems, analyses of the Middle East problems and what he calls the backwardness of Muslim countries.
His speeches are often reprinted in Africa and the Middle East and his newspaper columns are popular in Japan.
But he made his biggest impact in 1970 with a book titled “The Malay Dilemma”, dissecting his own people’s shortcomings in an analysis drawn heavily from social Darwinism.
Born in 1925, the experiences of British colonial rule and the Japanese occupation during the World War II along with a modern view of Islam, shaped Mahathir’s opinions.
But nearly 80 percent of Malaysia’s 24 million population were born after independence from Britain in 1957, and many are tired of hearing the same old lectures.
But friend and foe alike recognise Mahathir’s leading role in industrialising Malaysia.
He will address UMNO’s conference as the party president for the last time on Saturday, and, given the occasion, the speech is likely to end on an emotional note. There will most likely be tears even if the speech is one the delegates have all heard before. |
| |
|
|
|
|
|
