Mahathir trying to save his son from going to jail

By MT Webmaster Last updated Feb 16, 2016

Yes, Dr Mahathir’s next son is going to face a worse fate than just getting sacked as Menteri Besar. This fate may involve a stint in jail. And there is nothing Dr Mahathir can do about it unless he brings Gani back as Attorney General — and that is never going to happen in a million years.

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

To understand why Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad is very much opposed to Attorney General Mohamed Apandi Ali who replaced Abdul Gani Patail last year, we need to first dabble in a bit of history. This whole thing started during what is now known as Malaysia’s 1988 Judicial Crisis.

In 1987, Dr Mahathir won the party presidency against Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah by just 43 votes. Tengku Razaleigh’s supporters, however, refused to accept the results because of the allegation that there were 78 illegal delegates amongst the 1,479 delegates. And they felt that without these ‘illegals’ Tengku Razaleigh would have won instead.

Tengku Razaleigh’s supporters demanded for new elections to be held while Dr Mahathir refused because his people told him that the second time around he was going to lose. In fact, I was present in that meeting with Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail’s father, Pak Wan, when the matter was discussed and the opinion then was that Tengku Razaleigh would most likely win the second time around.

The matter was then brought to court and this upset Dr Mahathir who commented, “The judiciary says, ‘Although you passed a law with a certain thing in mind, we think that your mind is wrong, and we want to give our interpretation.’ If we disagree, the courts will say, ‘We will interpret your disagreement.’ … We know exactly what we want to do, but once we do it, it is interpreted in a different way.”

Dr Mahathir then attacked what he called the ‘Black Sheep’ in the judiciary, Justice Harun Hashim who presided over the UMNO case being one of them. Dr Mahathir then ordered that Harun be transferred from appellate and special powers cases to commercial crimes, a sort of cold storage for ‘recalcitrant’ judges. However, the transfer could only come into effect once the Umno case is over and there was nothing Dr Mahathir could do about that.

Dr Mahathir was outraged with what he viewed as the judiciary’s increasing independence, and in 1988, the government tabled a Bill in Parliament to amend Articles 121 and 145 of the Constitution. These amendments divested the courts of the ‘judicial power of the Federation’, giving them only such power as Parliament might grant them. The Attorney General was also empowered to determine the venues in which cases would be heard.

In short, the judiciary lost quite a bit of its powers while the Attorney General became more powerful. And this was the way Dr Mahathir was going to ensure that in future things went his way and not against him.

Tun Salleh Abas, the then Lord President (now called Chief Justice) of the Supreme Court (now called Federal Court), spoke out strongly about defending the autonomy of the judiciary. Salleh convened a meeting of 20 Federal judges and they decided to write a letter to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and all the rulers of the various states. The letter said, “All of us are disappointed with the various comments and accusations made by the Honourable Prime Minister against the Judiciary, not only outside but within the Parliament.”

Salleh claimed that Dr Mahathir summoned him for a meeting and accused him of bias in the UMNO case. Dr Mahathir then demanded Salleh’s resignation and immediately suspended him from his post as Lord President. The suspension was then backdated so as to nullify some of Salleh’s earlier decisions such as in the pending UMNO case.

What needs special attention here is that while Salleh alleged that it was Dr Mahathir who sacked him, Dr Mahathir, however, said that it was the Agong who had sacked Salleh over a dispute involving the Agong’s house renovation. The bottom line, however, is that Salleh was sacked, the judiciary lost its powers, and the Attorney General became more powerful, all because Dr Mahathir wanted control over everything.

Gani Patail, who was given the task of making sure that Anwar Ibrahim got sent to jail by hook or by crook, was made the Attorney General in 2002 to replace Ainum Mohd Saaid who became the Attorney General just the year before that. Gani was already very unpopular, and when he was made the Attorney General, Anwar Ibrahim alleged that this was a reward for fixing him up on fabricated charges of sodomy.

While the sacking of Salleh as Lord President (plus the suspension and/or transfer of other renowned senior judges) was seen as the death of the judiciary, the appointment of Gani as Attorney General was seen as the death of justice. That was the day Malaysia became just another third-world country.

In fact, the joke that was making its rounds at that time went as follows:

Dr Mahathir visited Saudi Arabia and was introduced to the Saudi Minister of Railway. “Why do you have a Minister of Railway when your country does not have any railway?” asked Dr Mahathir. “Well, your country does not have any justice and yet you have a Minister of Justice,” came the reply.

Of the many sins that Dr Mahathir is said to have committed in his 22 years as Prime Minister, what he did to the judiciary and the justice system is said to be the worst of the lot. The sacking of Tun Salleh as Lord President and the appointment of Gani as the Attorney General will go down in history as the turning point for Malaysia when the country began to slide down that slippery slope.

Dr Mahathir insists until today that he did not sack Tun Salleh — the Agong did, because only the Agong can do that. Well, it was also not Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak who sacked Gani Patail either — the Agong did, because only the Agong can do that. As Dr Mahathir cannot take over the powers of the Agong so can’t Najib.

But why would the Agong want Gani replaced? Simple! Just like in the case of part-time Kedah Menteri Besar Mukhriz, Gani was also a part-time Attorney General. Gani has to spend most of his time in hospital for dialysis treatment and in the less than 50% of the time he spends in office he is too sick to focus 100% on his work.

So why is this so upsetting to Dr Mahathir? It is a decision that the Agong made, just like the decision to sack the Lord President, Salleh, according to what Dr Mahathir tells us. Why does Dr Mahathir still want Gani in office and why is he so afraid of Apandi?

The answer is actually very simple. The Securities Commission (SC) is investigating Dr Mahathir’s son, Mokhzani, for the crime on insider trading. According to the law, this offence carries a punishment of an imprisonment term not exceeding 10 years and a fine of not less than RM1 million.

Dr Mahathir was told that the SC has a strong case and that there is enough evidence for the Attorney General to press charges. If Gani was still the Attorney General then he could bury this case. With Apandi as Attorney General, however, this would be most difficult.

So this is why Dr Mahathir is running down Apandi. He wants to smear Apandi’s reputation and make people think that the Attorney General is Najib’s attack dog. Then, when the government charges Mokhzani, Dr Mahathir can scream political conspiracy just like what Anwar Ibrahim is doing regarding his two sodomy convictions.

Dr Mahathir is learning from Anwar the proper way to play the victim. And you must do this before the explosion happens so that when it finally does you can turn around and say, “I told you so.” You pre-empt what the other side is going to do so that you can say you knew this was going to happen and the reason they are doing this is to fix you up on false allegations and fabricated charges.

Raja Petra Kamarudin RPK