Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times Read online

  Some of the Southeast Asian resentment against Dr. Mahathir surfaced after he sacked and jailed his deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, in 1998. Joining predictable Western outrage, the leaders of Indonesia and the Philippines criticized Dr. Mahathir, and Thailand expressed concern. Cory Aquino, a former Philippine president who carried considerable moral authority, also rebuked him, while regional newspapers, non-governmental organizations and commentators denounced his conduct in unprecedented fashion.

  In the United States, where Dr. Mahathir was already notorious for blaming "rogue speculators" led by George Soros for the Asian economic crisis, President Bill Clinton's administration treated him as a virtual pariah. Deputising for Clinton at an APEC summit in Kuala Lumpur in November 1998, Vice President Al Gore infuriated his hosts by publicly backing Anwar's Reformasi movement. Dr. Mahathir continued to attract adverse publicity over currency controls, Anwar's trials and a crackdown on political opponents. "September 11" rescued him. After terrorists crashed hijacked aircraft into the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington on 11 September 2001, President George W. Bush, who had been reluctant to meet Dr. Mahathir, embraced Malaysia as a partner in his "war on terror".

  What Bush did not know was that Dr. Mahathir, at the height of his unpopularity over Anwar, had decided it was time to mend fences with Washington. Mahathir associates secretly paid US$1.2 million to American lobbyists to arrange the rapprochement, the money being channeled through the well-connected Jack Abramoff, who was subsequently jailed for improperly influencing members of Congress and their aides.[137] Only when scandal engulfed Abramoff years later did it become known that he was being paid by the Malaysian embassy in Washington, and that some of the funds went to analysts in the United States writing favourable commentaries about Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur also won points by cooperating with U.S. authorities in passing on intelligence about some of the "September 11" hijackers who had passed through Malaysia and others with al-Qaeda connections. The outcome was a meeting in Washington in 2002 between Dr. Mahathir and Bush, which both sides sought, as Dr. Mahathir made his first visit to the United States in eight years.

  In their three-hour session, Bush did not mention Anwar's mistreatment, and he later praised Dr. Mahathir for his strong support in combating terrorism. The president hailed Malaysia as "a modern, moderate and prosperous Muslim state", and "an important example to the region and the rest of the world".[138] Bush obviously hoped Dr. Mahathir, who was to chair both the Non-Aligned Movement and the OIC, beginning in 2003, would help swing moderate Muslims behind Washington's anti-terrorist campaign.

  It did not work out like that. As the United States-led forces attacked Iraq in early 2003, Dr. Mahathir slipped back into his anti-American rhetoric, describing the superpower as a "cowardly and imperialist" bully[139] that was using "September 11" as an excuse to attack Muslim nations.[140] He deeply angered the Americans by referring to victims of the September 11 attacks and the Bali bombing in October 2002 as collateral damage.[141] The vitriolic denunciations persisted, becoming ever more shrill and "going beyond normal expressions of opposition", as a senior American official put it, until Dr. Mahathir retired later in the year.[142]

  With Dr. Mahathir's departure and the installation of Abdullah Badawi in 2003, the tone of Malaysia's relations with the United States, Australia and Singapore changed overnight. Abdullah made arrangements to visit the three countries, signalling an end to the open hostility and giving Dr. Mahathir another reason to feel betrayed by his successor. Dr. Mahathir complained to a friend that Abdullah had "completely" reversed his policy towards Washington, Canberra and Singapore.[143] A significant by-product of Kuala Lumpur's about-face was the inclusion of Australia and New Zealand in regional councils. Their prime ministers were invited to the annual ASEAN Summit in 2004, and ASEAN asked them to resume talks on the long-delayed free-trade area.[144] Moreover, Australia and New Zealand, along with India, were included in the line-up for the inaugural East Asia Summit in 2005. Dr. Mahathir was still protesting their inclusion when it opened in Kuala Lumpur.

  Notes

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  Ibid.

  Ibid.

  Kim Richard Nossal and Richard Stubbs, "Mahathir's Malaysia: An Emerging Middle Power?", in Andrew Cooper, ed., Niche Diplomacy: Middle Powers after the Cold War (Houndmills: Macmillan Press, 1997), pp. 147-163.

  Johan Saravanamuttu, "Iconoclasm and Foreign Policy — The Mahathir Years", in Bridget Welsh, ed., Reflections: The Mahathir Years (Washington: Southeast Asia Studies Program, The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, 2004), p. 307.

  John Funston, "Australia-Malaysia Relations: A Maturing Partnership", in Zaniah Marshallsay, ed., Australia-Malaysia Relations: New Roads Ahead (Clayton: Monash Asia Institute, 1996), p. 91.

  Shamsul A.B., "Australia in Contemporary Malaysia's Worldview", in Australia-Malaysia Relations, p. 70.

  John Funston, "Australia-Malaysia Relations: A Maturing Partnership", p. 91.

  Joseph Liow, "Personality, Exigencies and Contingencies: Determinants of Malaysia's Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Administration", in Ho Khai Leong and James Chin, eds, Mahathir's Administration: Performance and Crisis in Governance (Singapore: Times Books International, 2001), p. 157.

  Ibid., p. 154.

  Joseph Chinyong Liow, The Politics of Indonesia-Malaysia Relations: One Kin, Two Nations (London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005), p. 134.

  Hajrudin Somun, The Secret of the Malaysian Success (Subang Jaya: Pelanduk Publications (M) Sdn. Bhd., 2003), p. 176.

  Email correspondence, 25 July 2008, with Marvin C. Ott, professor, National Security Strategy, National War College, Washington, D.C., who is researching a book on Malaysian foreign policy.

  Ibid.

  Chandran Jeshurun, "Malaysian Defence Policy Under Mahathir: What has Changed?", in Reflections, p. 335.

  Mahathir Mohamad, "Trends in Foreign Policy and Regionalism", in "Proceedings and Background Paper of Seminar on Trends in Malaysia", edited by Patrick Low, Trends in Southeast Asia, no. 2 (1971), Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, p. 33.

  Ibid., p. 36.

  Joseph Liow, "Personality, Exigencies and Contingencies", p. 129.

  Barry Wain, The Refused: The Agony of the Indochina Refugees (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1981), pp. 96-97, 274-275, fn 1.

  Karminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003): Dilemmas of Development (Singapore: NUS Press, 2009), p. 161.

  Ibid., pp. 163-164.

  Mahathir Mohamad, "West and East", in The Challenge (Petaling Jaya: Pelanduk Publications (M) Sdn. Bhd., 1986), pp. 46-47.

  Ibid., p. 54.

  New Straits Times, 16 July 1982.

  K. Das, "Malaysia's 'Restoration'", Far Eastern Economic Review, 11 June 1982, p. 38.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  Mahathir Mohamad, A New Deal for Asia (Subang Jaya: Pelanduk Publications (M) Sdn. Bhd., 1999), p. 16.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  Mahathir Mohamad, A New Deal for Asia, pp. 14-15.

  Cheah Boon Kheng, "The 'Black-out' Syndrome and the Ghosts of World War II: The War as a 'Divisive Issue' in Malaysia", in David Koh Wee Hock, ed., Legacies of World War II in South and East Asia (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2007), pp. 47, 48.

  Paul A. Kratoska, The Japanese Occupation of Malaya: A Social and Economic History (London: Hurst & Co., 1998), p. 86.

  Cheah Boon Kheng, "The 'Black-out' Syndrome and the Ghosts of World War II", p. 48.

  Ibid., p. 51.

  Ibid., p. 47.

  Mahathir Mohamad, A New Deal for Asia, pp. 16-17.

  "Forget the Past, PM tells Muruyama", Star, 28 August 1994, cited in Cheah Boon Kheng, "The 'Black-out' Syndrome and the Ghosts of World War II", p. 49.

  Mahathir Mohamad, "Quo Vadis Malaysia?", in The Challenge, p. 163.

 
Zainuddin Maidin, The Other Side of Mahathir (Kuala Lumpur: Utusan Publications and Distributors Sdn. Bhd., 1994), p. 97.

  Ibid., p. 97.

  Ibid., p. 97.

  Interview with Daim Zainuddin, 18 October 2007.

  Roger Kershaw, "Brown Humanity Strikes Back: Confronting Britain in a Good Cause?", in Reflections, p. 347.

  Ibid., pp. 347-348.

  Ibid., p. 347.

  Ibid., p. 344.

  Ibid., p. 349.

  Mahathir Mohamad, Appendix 5, in The Other Side of Mahathir, pp. 303-306.

  Karminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003), p. 170.

  Raphael Pura, "Mahathir's U.S. Trip Showcases Better Ties", Asian Wall Street Journal, 10 January 1984.

  Jomo K.S., M Way: Mahathir's Economic Legacy (Kuala Lumpur: Forum, 2003), p. 40.

  William E. Berry, Jr., "Threat Perceptions in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore", INSS Occasional Paper 16, September 1997, USAF Institute for National Security Studies.

  Email correspondence, 28 November 2007, with William E. Berry, Jr., U.S. air attache in Kuala Lumpur 1990-93.

  Mahathir Mohamad, speech in conjunction with the celebration of the 41st anniversary of the United Nations, 25 October 1986, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism: An Intellectual Biography of Mahathir Mohamad (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 96, fn 131.

  William E. Berry, Jr., "Threat Perceptions in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore".

  Anil Netto, "Fear, Fanaticism and an Asian Tightrope Act", AsiaTimes Online, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/printN.html (accessed 18 July 2007).

  Najib Abdul Razak, "U.S.-Malaysia Defence Cooperation: A Solid Success Story", address to the Heritage Foundation and Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, 3 May 2002. Heritage Lecture no. 742.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  William E. Berry, Jr., "Threat Perceptions in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore".

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  John Funston, "Australia-Malaysia Relations: A Maturing Partnership", p. 91.

  David Camroux, "'Looking East'...and Inwards: Internal Factors in Malaysian Foreign Relations During the Mahathir Era, 1981-1994", Australia-Asia Papers no. 72, October 1994, Griffith University, p. 44.

  Barry Wain, "Malaysia's New Priorities in Foreign Policy", Asian Wall Street Journal, 16 November 1981.

  John Funston, "The Legacy of Dr. Mahathir", Australian Financial Review, 30 July 2004.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  Chandran Jeshurun, Malaysia: Fifty Years of Diplomacy 1957-2007 (Kuala Lumpur: The Other Press Sdn. Bhd., 2007), p. 170.

  Greg Sheridan, Tigers: Leaders of the New Asia-Pacific (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1997), p. 169.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  "The Full Text of Datuk Seri Dr. Mahathir's reply dated April 25", New Straits Times, 30 May 1988.

  Shamsul A.B., "Australia in Contemporary Malaysia's Worldview", pp. 71-72.

  John Funston, "The Legacy of Dr. Mahathir".

  Joseph Liow, "Personality, Exigencies and Contingencies", p. 157.

  Statement by Abraham H. Foxman, National Director, Anti-Defamation League, "ADL Calls on Leaders of Civilized Nations to Condemn Call for Holy War Against Jews", 16 October 2003.

  Mahathir bin Mohamad, The Malay Dilemma (Singapore: Times Books International, 1999 edition), p. 84.

  Ibid., p. 84.

  Leslie Lopez, "Malaysia Strains U.S. Tolerance", Asian Wall Street Journal, 27 June 2003.

  "Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad: On the Jews", interview with Bangkok Post, 21 October 2003, cited on Anti-Defamation League website, http://www.adl.org/Anti_semitism/Malaysian_1.asp (accessed 27 January 2006).

  Patricia Martinez, "Perhaps He Deserved Better: The Disjuncture between Vision and Reality in Mahathir's Islam", in Reflections, p. 35.

  "Mahathir Attack on Jews Condemned", CNN.com, 16 October 2003, http://cnn.worldnews.printthis.clickability.com/pt/cpt?action=cpt&title=CNN.com+-+ (accessed 27 January 2006).

  Mahathir Mohamad, speech at the Tenth Islamic Summit Conference, Putrajaya, Malaysia, 16 October 2003.

  Ibid.

  Mahathir Mohamad, speech at the Foreign Policy Association, 19 January 1984, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism, p. 59.

  Mahathir Mohamad, speech at the dinner hosted by Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, 24 January 1983, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism, p. 59.

  Mahathir Mohamad, keynote address at the ASEAN-EEC industrial sector conference, 28 February 1983, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism, p. 62.

  Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Malaysia, http://www.kln.gov.my/english/foreignaffairs/foreignpolicy/myforeign.htm (accessed 31 March 2006).

  Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism, p. 64.

  Ibid, p. 62.

  Mahathir Mohamad, speech at 5th joint conference MAJECA/JAMECA, 8 February 1982, cited in Khoo Boo Teik, Paradoxes of Mahathirism, p. 62.

  Joseph Liow, "Personality, Exigencies and Contingencies", p. 148.

  Ibid., p. 148.

  Captain Johari Ramzan Ahmad, "Malaysia's Peacekeeping Effort: A Personal Perspective", The Liaison, 3, no. 1, http://www.coe-dmha.org/Liaison/Vol_3No_1/index.htm (accessed 30 November 2007).

  Ibid.

  Chandran Jeshurun, Malaysia: Fifty Years of Diplomacy 1957-2007, pp. 252-253.

  "Malaysia's Mahathir: New Voice for the Third World", Far Eastern Economic Review, 20 August 1992, cover.

  Kim Richard Nossal and Richard Stubbs, "Mahathir's Malaysia: An Emerging Middle Power?", p. 155.

  Ibid., pp. 155-156.

  R.S. Milne and Diane K. Mauzy, Malaysian Politics Under Mahathir (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 139.

  S. Jayasankaran and Nate Thayer, "From Logs to Lotus", Far Eastern Economic Review, 12 December 1996, pp. 64-69.

  Ibid., p. 66.

  Karminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003), p. 252.

  Jomo K.S., "Introduction", in Jomo K.S., ed., Ugly Malaysians?: South-South Investments Abused (Durban: Institute for Black Research, 2002), p. 11.

  S. Jayasankaran and Nate Thayer, "From Logs to Lotus", p. 66.

  Ibid., p. 66.

  Ibid., p. 69.

  Vishu Padayachee and Imraan Valodia, "Developing South-South Links?: Malaysian Investment in Post-Apartheid South Africa", in Ugly Malaysians?, p. 36.

  S. Jayasankaran and Nate Thayer, "From Logs to Lotus", p. 69.

  Ibid., p. 65.

  Kaminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003), p. 257.

  Ian Stewart, The Mahathir Legacy: A Nation Divided, a Region at Risk (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2003), p. 3.

  Interview with Rodolfo C. Severino, 29 March 2006.

  Barry Wain, "U.N. Myanmar Envoy Hints at Resignation If Talks Don't Proceed", Asian Wall Street Journal, 19 November 2002.

  Barry Wain, "Yangon Doesn't Want Reconciliation Help", Asian Wall Street Journal, 26 August 2002.

  Barry Wain, "Mahathir Won't Meet Dissident", Asian Wall Street Journal, 19 August 2002.

  Rodolfo C. Severino, Southeast Asia in Search of an ASEAN Community: Insights from the Former ASEAN Secretary-General (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2006), p. 227.

  Kaminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003), pp. 217-218.

  Graeme Dobell, Australia Finds Home (Sydney: ABC Books, 2000), p. 36.

  Rodolfo C. Severino, Southeast Asia in Search of an ASEAN Community, p. 266.

  Graeme Dobell, Australia Finds Home, pp. 37-38.

  Ibid., p. 40.

  The Angkor Agenda: Report of the High-Level Task Force on the AFTA-CER Free Trade Area, http://www.aseansec.org/angkor_agenda.pdf (accessed 2 September 2008).

  Chin Kin Wah and Michael Richardson, Australia-New Zealand & Southea
st Asia Relations: An Agenda for Closer Cooperation (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2004), pp. 27-28.

  Ibid., p. 28.

  Jeremy Hurewitz, "Interview", Far Eastern Economic Review, March 2006, p. 54.

  Greg Sheridan, Tigers: Leaders of the New Asia-Pacific, (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1997), p. 200.

  Joseph Chinyong Liow, The Politics of Indonesia-Malaysia Relations, p. 132.

  Ibid., p. 136.

  Ibid., p. 167.

  Interview with senior Southeast Asian official, 3 November 2006.

  Interview with Mahathir Mohamad, 14 August 2007.

  K.S. Nathan, "Malaysia-Singapore Relations: Retrospect and Prospect", Contemporary Southeast Asia 24, no. 2 (August 2002): 404.

  Lee Kuan Yew, From Third World to First: The Singapore Story: 1965-2000 (Singapore: Times Media Pte. Ltd., 2000), p. 280.

  Ibid., pp. 275, 279-281, 289.

  Kaminder Singh Dhillon, Malaysian Foreign Policy in the Mahathir Era (1981-2003), p. 136, fn 93, citing Straits Times, 18 February 1990. Suhaini Aznam, "Neighbourly Interest", Far Eastern Economic Review, 21 December 1989, p. 20.

  Chandran Jeshurun, Malaysia: Fifty Years of Diplomacy 1957-2007, p. 297.