Loved and loathed, Malaysia's Mahathir leaves complex legacy

Loved and loathed, Malaysia's Mahathir leaves complex legacy

Lawrence Bartlett, Agence France-Presse, Kuala Lumpur

Loved and loathed but rarely ignored, Malaysia's Prime Minister
Mahathir Mohamad leaves a complex legacy when he retires on
Friday.

He is seen by some in the West as a Muslim bigot, but for 22
years he has run a moderate multi-racial, multi-religious
country.

Mahathir is a sharp critic of Western capitalism, but has
transformed Malaysia from a sleepy tin and rubber exporter into a
vibrant manufacturing nation.

He is accused of being dictatorial, but is stepping down
voluntarily with a democratic system, though criticized as
flawed, still in place.

Trying to pigeonhole Asia's longest-serving elected leader,
even his critics say, is pointless because he is unique.

When Mahathir created his latest international uproar by
telling an Islamic summit this month that "Jews rule this world",
an Israeli ambassador in the region condemned the rhetoric but
admitted to being "confused" by a simultaneous call for an end to
Palestinian violence.

Australia has long been a target of the Malaysian leader's
invective -- he described it recently as "some sort of
transplant" in Asia -- but Foreign Minister Alexander Downer
conceded just a week ago that Mahathir had "done a very good job"
with the economy.

Another measure of the West's difficulty in dealing with
Mahathir is shown by the sudden drop in the clamor against his
human rights record since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the
United States.

A major criticism had been his use of a security law allowing
indefinite detention without trial, but with alleged Muslim
militants now the main targets and the U.S. and other Western
countries beefing up their own security laws, the objections have
become muted.

In person, the 77-year-old Mahathir's mild demeanor is spiced
with a sharp sense of humor and an ability to shrug off the
brickbats thrown at him.

"People say I am a dictator, but they can say what they like,"
he told AFP in a recent interview. "I would like one day for
people to stand outside the cabinet room, to hear the laughter
and the jokes.

"We are very relaxed with each other, we are friends. It's a
team that is very representative of every race, culture and
religion. We have Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Taoists...
everybody is there and we have to reach agreement among
ourselves."

He said he believed his greatest achievement had been
maintaining racial harmony in a country made up of about 65
percent Malays and other indigenous people and large Chinese and
Indian minorities.

His greatest failure, he said, "is that I still cannot get the
indigenous people, the Malays in particular, to understand the
workings of a free market economy and what they must do about
it."

Race, clearly, is central to Mahathir's vision of the world,
and one of the reasons people are so often shocked by him is that
he speaks bluntly about his racial perceptions.

In June, he accused the "European race", including Americans
and Australians, of warmongering, indiscriminate attacks on
Muslims, greed and sexual deviancy.

At the same time, he said: "They are very clever, brave and
have an insatiable curiosity".

Even his widely condemned remarks about Jews contained
admiration. They "survived 2000 years of pogroms not by hitting
back, but by thinking", he said, calling on Muslims to emulate
them.

His victims abroad often forget that he doesn't spare his own
Malay people -- whom he calls lazy -- or Muslims generally, who
he says should match their religious piety with studies of
science and mathematics so they can catch up with the West.

He ensured that a deal this year to buy fighter jets from
Russia included a trip into space for a Malaysian, and the search
is now on for the country's first cosmonaut.

Born on Dec. 20, 1925, the youngest of 10 children of an
immigrant schoolteacher father of Indian descent and a Malay
mother, Mahathir trained and practiced as a doctor before going
into politics in 1964.

He was expelled from the ruling United Malays National
Organization (UMNO) -- for criticizing the prime minister -- but
after his rehabilitation began a rapid rise through the ranks.

Mahathir became prime minister in July 1981 -- when Ronald
Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were newcomers to power in the
United States and Britain.

Thatcher, dubbed the "Iron Lady" during the Cold War, once
said of Mahathir: "We both believe in speaking our minds. It's
just as well he is a man, for he'd have been lethal with a
handbag."

Asked whether he agreed with this assessment, Mahathir
replied: "I think, in a way, what she says is right. We don't
think in terms of being popular all the time. I think that is
what leadership is all about."

Putting that philosophy into practice earned him a reputation
as an international maverick.

Faced by one of the biggest crises of his tenure, the Asian
financial collapse of 1997-98, he did the opposite of what the
International Monetary Fund and mainstream economists advised,
imposing capital controls and pegging the currency to the U.S.
dollar.

This year, the IMF acknowledged that he had been right and his
country had taken a shallower dive and staged a quicker recovery
than others in the region.

But Mahathir's record will be blemished for many by his action
around the same time against his then deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, who
was sacked then jailed for 15 years on charges of sodomy and
corruption.

Anwar, who says the action was taken to prevent him from
mounting a political challenge, is still listed by the United
States and human rights groups as a political prisoner.

Critics say the confrontational premier has bent independent
national institutions such as the judiciary to his iron will,
stifled dissent and severely limited press freedom.

But for many leaders in Southeast Asia, his successes eclipse
his faults.

Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri had to choke back
the tears as she bade him farewell at a recent summit, saying:
"The mark of his statesmanship has been implanted deep in our
consciousness. The reach of his mind is so far and wide."

That mind, he told AFP, would be put to use during his
retirement to write his memoirs -- which could well take their
title from what is reportedly his favorite song "I did it my
way."