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FROM AKI ADNKRONOS INTERNATIONAL
Kuala Lumpur, 17 Sept. (AKI) - Former Malaysian Prime Minister and strongman Mahathir Mohamad is to rejoin the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), his son Mukhriz announced.
Mahathir led the party for 22 years but quit in May of this year. His change of heart is a clear attempt to close party ranks and resist Malaysia’s de facto opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s ambitions to govern, according to observers.
UNMNO’s vice-president, Muhyiddin Yassin, told The South China Morning Post newspaper Mahathir’s return “will help to boost party morale”.
According to leaked information, Mahathir should become the head of a presidential advisory council, a party body that to advise Malaysia’s Premier, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.
Mahathir left the UMNO after frequent attacks against Abdullah, and a permanent rift appeared to have opened up between the two.
He will rejoin the party at a time when the Barisan Nasional government, of which UMNO is the leading party, has come under huge pressure from the opposition, and risks losing control of the country for the first time since 1957.
The government lost its two-thirds majority in an election in March and Abdullah has come under renewed pressure to resign.
Anwar, who leads a three-party alliance, has said that at least 31 MPs from the ruling coalition have said they will join him.
This would give Anwar enough parliamentary votes to govern: he already controls 82 seats and needs 30 more to have a majority in the 222-seat legislature.
On Tuesday he called for talks with Abdullah to hand over power. Malaysia’s former deputy Prime Minister, Anwar faces what he says are politically motivated charges of sodomy.
Anwar was sacked as deputy prime minister in 1998 and in the late 1990s was jailed for six years for sodomy and corruption - allegations he always denied.
Anwar had been seen as Mahathir’s heir until he disagreed with him on economic policy in the wake of the Asian financial crisis.
Mahathir’s return politics could pit him against his old adversary.