Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times Barry Wain (grave mercy .TXT) 📖

able to confront Dr. Mahathir in a courtroom, where they would be sworn to tell the truth. Dr. Mahathir said he would have liked to have given evidence so he could explain "how he became convinced" by the allegations against Anwar, but he ducked every opportunity to do so. In the first trial, the defence said it intended to call the prime minister as a witness, but dropped the idea after complaining that Dr. Mahathir refused to make a written statement before his planned appearance. The judge in the second trial, supporting Dr. Mahathir's resistance to a subpoena, ruled that he would not be a material witness. Although Anwar's lawyers appealed to both the Court of Appeal and the Federal Court, they declined to reverse that ruling. After he was cleared of sodomy, Anwar attempted to sue Dr. Mahathir for defamation for continuing to call him a homosexual. Branding the action frivolous and an abuse of the legal process, Dr. Mahathir's lawyers persuaded the High Court in 2007 to reject the RM100 million suit. Anwar's appeal was still pending in early 2009.

If there was any consolation for Anwar in the ruins of a political career, it was that the conviction had little effect on his standing. After his release from prison and spinal surgery in Germany, he was treated as a wronged politician rather than a criminal who had served his time, in keeping with Amnesty International's adoption of him as a prisoner of conscience and a statement by a Human Rights Watch official that Anwar was the victim of a "political vendetta" by Dr. Mahathir. Anwar accepted attachments at three prestigious universities, Oxford in England and Georgetown and Johns Hopkins in the United States, and was in demand on the international lecture circuit, before returning to fulltime politics in Malaysia in 2006. He was touted as a possible head of the United Nations in 2007, and though he was never a serious candidate to replace Kofi Annan, the speculation reflected the esteem in which he was still held.

For Dr. Mahathir, Anwar's political evisceration carried a steep price. The entire episode exposed a pattern of political manipulation of Malaysia's key state institutions, among them the police, public prosecutor's office and the judiciary. Said Awang, the Special Branch director, testified that he might lie under oath if instructed to do so by the prime minister, and acknowledged a situation could arise where he might have to do something illegal if requested by Dr. Mahathir or the police chief.

Court testimony also reflected on Dr. Mahathir personally, suggesting he had blocked a corruption investigation only months before Anwar was arraigned for allegedly doing the same thing. Shafie Yahya, the former head of Malaysia's Anti-Corruption Agency, said Dr. Mahathir had told him in June 1998 to stop investigating Ali Abul Hassan Sulaiman, Director General of the Economic Planning Unit, the powerful agency that awarded privatization projects. Ali Abul Hassan was made governor of Bank Negara the day before Anwar was dismissed. The Anti-Corruption Agency, like the Economic Planning Unit, was part of the Prime Minister's Department. Shafie told the court that after he had responded to an official complaint and found large amounts of cash in a drawer in Ali Abul Hassan's office, he was called by Dr. Mahathir, who scolded him and told him to close the case. According to Shafie, Dr. Mahathir had said, "How dare you raid my senior officer's office", and accused Shafie of "trying to fix" Ali Abul Hassan. Shafie said he was disillusioned by Dr. Mahathir's intervention and wanted to resign, but his wife persuaded him to serve out the remaining months of his contract.[91]

If Shafie's account was untrue, as Dr. Mahathir claimed, Shafie should have been charged with perjury. But he was not. Nor did the police make any attempt to clear Dr. Mahathir's name or investigate him for a possible crime, though years later an official said the attorney general had decided not to pursue the matter because of inconsistencies in witnesses' statements and a lack of supporting evidence.[92] Lawyers who inquired informally in the attorney general's department were advised to be realistic — nobody would dare interrogate the prime minister.[93]

Notes

Raphael Pura, "Anwar Alleges 'Conspiracy' in His Dismissal", Asian Wall Street Journal, 4 September 1998.

John Funston, "Political Careers of Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim: Parallel, Intersecting and Conflicting Lives", IKMAS Working Papers (Institute of Malaysian and International Studies, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia) no. 15 (July 1998): i-iv, 1-32.

Ibid.

Interviews with Tunku Abdullah Tuanku Abdul Rahman, 22 March 2007; Mahathir Mohamad, 31 March 2008; and Anwar Ibrahim, 21 May 2008.

Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 31 March 2008.

Stephen Duthie, "Malaysia Wonders if Anwar, Mahathir Can Make a Team", Asian Wall Street Journal, 1 October 1993.

Daim was finance minister, while Sanusi was agriculture minister and UMNO secretary general.

John Funston, "Political Careers of Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim: Parallel, Intersecting and Conflicting Lives".

Stephen Duthie, "Malaysia Wonders if Anwar, Mahathir Can Make a Team".

Ibid.

Raphael Pura, "Anwar Deftly Navigates Shoals of Malaysian Crisis", Asian Wall Street Journal, 18 September 1997.

Ibid.

John Funston, "Political Careers of Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim: Parallel, Intersecting and Conflicting Lives".

Ibid.

Interview with Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali, 17 January 2008.

A. Kadir Jasin, "Anwar's Loyalty to Dr. M Not in Doubt", New Sunday Times, 15 October 1995.

In-Won Hwang, Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State Under Mahathir (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2003), p. 283.

V.G. Kulkarni, Murray Hiebert and S. Jayasankaran, "Tough Talk: Premier Mahathir Thrives on No-nonsense Policies", Far Eastern Economic Review, 24 October 1996, p. 23.

Ian Stewart, The Mahathir Legacy: A Nation Divided, a Region at Risk (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2003), p. 33.

John Funston, "A Fateful September", Southeast Asian Affairs 1999, p. 169.

In-Won Hwang, Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State Under Mahathir, p. 289.

"Too Absurd to be Believed", New Straits Times, 25 August 1997, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Beyond Mahathir: Malaysian Politics and Its Discontents (London: Zed Books Ltd., 2003), p. 78.

Khoo Boo Teik, Beyond Mahathir: Malaysian Politics and Its Discontents, p. 78.

Interview with Musa Hitam, 1 April 2008.

Raphael Pura,