A Doctor in The House: A Memoir of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad (84 page)

I knew he would not become destitute if he were no longer a Minister. When he joined the Government the first time, he was already a millionaire. He was wealthy when he left the Government then and I knew he was wealthy now when he was leaving a second time.

He was getting older, of course, and could look forward to a good life in retirement. I did not bring him back to balance him against Anwar, as many people believed. I admired his business acumen and his strong sense of purpose. One thing about him that I didn’t like, however, was his closeness to Lee Kuan Yew. At one time Lee wrote a letter to me saying Tun Daim was a good man and should be retained. Lee even attributed the currency controls to Tun Daim, though he had actually not been very keen.

Tun Daim and I remain friends to this day and I am invited to his 
buka puasa
 (breaking of the Ramadan fast) gathering in his house every year. On one occasion, he invited Hasmah and me for dinner at his palatial home and when we arrived, I was delighted to meet some very old friends. Soon more old friends arrived, one even in a wheelchair. Tun Daim and Toh Puan Mahani, his wife, wanted to celebrate my birthday with my friends and colleagues, to talk and reminisce, and generally to relive the good old days. The party was wonderful and everyone had a good time, although I also felt a little saddened that many of my old friends and colleagues could not be there.

On both occasions, Tun Daim never made a fuss about having to resign from Government. He is not a politician, he is a businessman, and so he never cared much whether or not he was a Minister. He was there because he could contribute. Tun Daim rendered great service to the nation—that is what I like to remember when I think of him.

ENDNOTE

[
1
] Tan Sri Wan Azmi Wan Hamzah founded Land & General Bhd; Tan Sri Halim Saad was the Executive Chairman of Renong Bhd, which controlled the UEM Group; Datuk Samsudin Abu Hassan’s business interests are largely based in South Africa, and Tan Sri Tajuddin Ramli was the former Executive Chairman of Malaysia Airlines.
 

As Prime Minister I was often described as having a dictatorial style and being intolerant of opposition. But if that were true, why did I face so many challenges within UMNO? I was also always ready to reconcile with the very people who had tried to overthrow me, and even went on to choose one of them to succeed me as party leader and Prime Minister when I voluntarily retired. Dictators, by the way, don’t retire—certainly not voluntarily.

Perhaps the most serious challenge I faced came during the 1987 UMNO General Assembly, when my former deputy Tun Musa Hitam teamed up with Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah to force me out of the party presidency. Tun Musa had resigned as Deputy Prime Minister the year before, though he still held the position of Deputy President of the party. Tengku Razaleigh had been the favourite for that post in the 1981 UMNO General Assembly that saw me formally elected as party President, but Tun Musa had managed to garner enough support to defeat him.

I had hoped that Tun Musa and I would have a good working relationship, better than the one I had with Tun Hussein Onn when I was his deputy, but the honeymoon period during our so-called MM or 2M administration did not last long. He did not give me the support I needed to push through key initiatives such as the national car project, and he was unhappy that I had chosen to retain Tengku Razaleigh in the Cabinet. Still, I was surprised when he sent me a letter in 1986 to say that he was resigning as my Deputy in Government and in the party.

UMNO Supreme Council members urged me to allow a delegation of party members to meet with Tun Musa in England, where he had gone after his resignation, to persuade him to return to the Government and to continue to be party Deputy President. They wanted to avoid a split in the party. A dictator might not have agreed to Musa’s return as it was clear that he was impatient about taking over the Presidency and the Prime Ministership from me. But I respected the members’ wishes and agreed to let a delegation of senior Supreme Council members go to London to see him. He agreed to remain as Deputy President of UMNO but refused to rejoin the Government headed by me. I had to appoint Tun Ghafar Baba as Deputy Prime Minister. For the first time, the UMNO Deputy President was not also the Deputy Prime Minister.

Tun Musa was expected to stage a comeback but I was not prepared for what he did next. He travelled to Davos in Switzerland to meet Tengku Razaleigh, who was attending the World Economic Forum, and persuaded him to contest the President’s post in the next party election while he would defend the Deputy President’s post.

I found this alliance to be mind-boggling—just before he resigned, Tun Musa had written me a letter expressing his disappointment that I had chosen to keep Tengku Razaleigh in the Government as Minister of International Trade and Industry. The two men had long been political rivals, and I think it was an indication of Tun Musa’s dislike of me that he now seemed willing to serve under his erstwhile enemy to bring me down. He seemed to believe in the adage that the enemy of your enemy is your friend.

With Tun Musa working openly against me, I had to get Tun Ghafar to contest the post of party Deputy President. In UMNO, the Deputy President also becomes the Deputy Prime Minister. Tun Musa’s choice to remain Deputy President while Tun Ghafar was the Deputy Prime Minister was therefore anomalous, and to regularise the situation, Tun Ghafar had to become Deputy President. It was simply easier if the same person held the posts as the thinking of UMNO would be clearly reflected in the Government. Of course, if Tengku Razaleigh and Tun Musa won, that anomalous position would be resolved too but differently—but to leave things as they were was untenable. Should Tengku Razaleigh win and Tun Musa lose or Tengku Razaleigh lose and Tun Musa win, there would be problems also. It was important that the challengers either won together or lost together.

With the battle lines drawn, UMNO members were now forced to take sides. The Press labelled us Team A, while Tengku Razaleigh and Tun Musa’s group was Team B. There must have been residual tensions between those two new allies, given their past rivalry, but during the campaign they worked closely enough and were able to win support even from within my camp. They were ably helped by Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, whose dislike for Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim—his rival for power in the Penang state UMNO—was intense. He had never quite accepted Anwar’s joining UMNO and becoming a government Minister. Years earlier, when Tun Abdullah was a government officer and Anwar a firebrand campus leader, Tun Razak had given him the task of ensuring Anwar was cut down to size. There was therefore no love lost between them.

Tunku Abdul Rahman, the first Prime Minister who had retired and then been out of active politics for 17 years, openly supported Team B. While I did not follow their campaign closely, I heard that the Tunku even let them hold meetings on his property under the guise of religious gatherings. The Tunku was sympathetic to that side simply because Tengku Razaleigh had lobbied him. Besides, Tengku Razaleigh had always been his favourite—even though they came from different royal houses, their common background had given Tengku Razaleigh special access to him. To fund Team B, I was told that Tengku Razaleigh sold his racecourse property to the Sultan of Brunei, for RM14 million.

We also heard that Team B spent about RM20 million on their campaign, with most of the money provided by Tengku Razaleigh himself. Team B’s campaign issues were simple: they said I was dictatorial and spent too much money on silly projects like the national car. Proton was not doing well at that time as the standard of the models being produced was not of the quality we had hoped for. The car company’s initial struggle seemed to lend weight to their claims. They also circulated a photograph of me with a Chinese lady who they alleged was my Singaporean wife. In fact, she was the wife of an old university classmate, and the picture had been taken at their daughter’s wedding.

In the beginning we appeared to have the support of the majority. Of the 120 UMNO divisions, more than 80 nominated me while fewer than 40 nominated Tengku Razaleigh for President. Confident that I would win hands down, I saw no great need to campaign. But Anwar, who was the head of UMNO Youth at the time, was not so certain. He knew his fortunes were tied with mine and if I lost, he would likely be dumped.

He urged me to campaign seriously and he started bringing groups of UMNO division committee members and other party stalwarts to my house for me to answer their questions and lobby for their support. Yet I found campaigning for myself very awkward. I had won the posts of Deputy President and then President without having to contest against anyone. When I had made a bid for the Vice-Presidency in 1972 and 1975, I did not campaign either. Now I found that I had to promote myself to advance my own cause when self-praise had never been easy for me. I still find it embarrassing and always avoid doing so if I can. Instead, during these meetings at my house I talked about the problems of the Malays and Malaysia and how they might be solved.

Some of the people Anwar brought to my home were frank, to the point of being rude. They criticised my appointments and choice of candidates. One lady, an ordinary member from Pahang, condemned me for appointing an Indian Muslim as Senator. I remember being taken aback by her forthrightness and lack of regard for a substantial community which needed to be represented.

Another person who came to these meetings was Datuk Mazlan Idris, who was a Pahang State Assemblyman at the time. He had been a loyal supporter of mine, but when Team B approached him and promised to make him 
Menteri Besar
, he switched over to their side. What he did not realise was that several people had already been promised the same thing. Mazlan was an educated man—he had a university degree in business—but that did not prevent him from seeing a 
bomoh
, or witch doctor, to increase his wealth. He believed that placing money under the bomoh’s wet 
sarong
 cloth for three nights would multiply the money several times over. That belief cost him his life, because the 
bomoh
 he went to see was the notorious Mona Fandey, who later murdered him in 1993.
[1]
 

On the campaign trail I was careful not to promise anyone anything. When you expect to win, as I did, you do not make promises which you know you cannot keep. This is a tactic you use only if you are desperate to win and you do not care what happenes afterwards. I believed I would

win, and with a good majority. Party members, I thought, would see that Tengku Razaleigh and Tun Musa were old enemies who were now joined in what was nothing more than an opportunistic alliance. They could not really work together—that would surely be clear to sensible UMNO delegates and members.

Party members cast their votes on 24 April 1987, a Friday. Voting had to be halted halfway for members to attend Friday congregational prayers, but Team B supporters used the interval to campaign. They were seen following targeted delegates to their hotels, even into the toilet, and I was told that a lot of money changed hands.

The Team B campaign was clearly effective as the voting results did not reflect the stand taken by the divisions at the nominations stage. Towards the end of the day, Anwar called to quietly inform me that the voting was very close. Team B, he said, was so confident of victory that they had already started celebrating. The news that the outcome was uncertain worried me enough to prepare myself mentally for whatever might happen next. I had long ago learnt that if you want something too much you can hurt yourself badly if you do not get it. It was a lesson I had been taught as a young student, waiting in vain to get a scholarship to study law when all my other friends were already leaving to study abroad. I had always been prepared to resign as Prime Minister and UMNO President. From the outset, I accepted that eventually I would have to step down—no political career could last forever. But I had been Prime Minister for only four years and there was still a lot to do. I needed to stay on to complete my work.

Two hours after the phone call from Anwar, we finally received news that Tun Ghafar and I had won. I defeated Tengku Razaleigh with 761 votes to his 718, a difference of only 43 votes. Tun Ghafar defeated Tun Musa by only 40 votes. Ready to accept defeat, I was relieved that I had won. But I was certainly disappointed by our thin margin of victory.

Still, it was a win. Team A’s candidates also won the majority of seats on the Supreme Council and two of the three Vice-President’s posts. Tun Abdullah won as Vice-President for Team B. In the wake of the elections Tengku Razaleigh resigned as Minister of International Trade and Industry, as did his fellow Team B member Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim, who stepped down as Foreign Minister. I also dropped three Cabinet Ministers and four Deputy Ministers who had joined Team B: Datuk Shahrir Abdul Samad from the Welfare Services Ministry; Datuk Abdul Ajib Ahmad from the Prime Minister’s Department; Tun Abdullah from the Defence Ministry; Deputy Minister Tan Sri Abdul Kadir Sheikh Fadzir from the Foreign Affairs Ministry; Deputy Minister Datuk Seri Radzi Sheikh Ahmad from the Primary Industries Ministry, Datin Paduka Rahmah Osman Deputy Minister from the Transport Ministry, and Datuk Zainal Abidin Zin Deputy Minister from the Energy, Telecommunications and Posts Ministry. I felt justified in removing them—they had not supported me and so would not be able to work with me as Cabinet members.

It is UMNO tradition for all problems and challenges to be resolved within the party, but it soon became clear that Tengku Razaleigh was unwilling to accept defeat. On 25 June, about two months after the party election, 11 Team B members filed a suit at the High Court to nullify the results of the General Assembly. Their contention was that members from 53 UMNO branches were not properly registered and their votes were accordingly invalid. I had heard earlier about their suit but did not believe they would proceed. Even if they did, this was, I thought, just a minor internal problem that the courts would dismiss. At most, they might order that the challenged UMNO members be disqualified and the votes recounted without them.