DM Monitoring
Kuala Lumpur: Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia’s longest-serving elected leader, in a recent interview with Al Jazeera, has denied corruption allegations levelled by incumbent Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.
The pair have had a tumultuous history spanning more than four decades.
As Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim expanded the scope of his government’s crackdown on corporate corruption, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) targeted former premier Mahathir Mohamad for the first time in March this year. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim later in May defended the government’s intensified actions, saying that the country needed to be saved from “greedy” people after the country lost around US$58.4 billion to graft between 2018 and 2023.
“Every time action is taken (against high-profile individuals), many complain and sigh. Some even defend them and give excuses: ‘Enough already. Don’t take revenge, they are already old,’” he said. “I congratulate and salute those who take action against them.” “I don’t want to fight. He has asked for proof, I will give (him) proof, no problem,” Anwar Ibrahim said.
Mahathir has said that there was no proof of any corruption against him, and denied Anwar’s claims that he took any money from the government. He said that the only money he made was from his salary, most of which is now gone. “I am curious as I have not seen this money and don’t know where they are. If I had taken the money, tell the court how you [Anwar] conclude that I had taken the money,” Mahathir reportedly told Al Jazeera.
“During my time, there was corruption. But I myself was not involved in corrupt practices,” he told CNBC.
Mahathir was in office from 1981 to 2003 under the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) platform.
Anwar who joined politics under the banner of an anti-corruption movement allied with Mahathir in the early 1980s. He soon became Mahathir’s deputy and protege.
But things between the two took a turn and Anwar Ibrahim spent years behind bars on sodomy charges towards the latter end of Mahatir’s rule.
