Political debate here on aljazeera. And. You can. See. My wife took the musketeer mohammed served as malaysias Prime Minister for 22 years from 1981 to 2003 but the 94 year old veteran politician return to politics a few years back to oppose the Political Force he was once paul told the sun National Coalition which should move malaysia since its independence from britain in 1970. During mohammads 1st 10 years malaysias Prime Minister the country experienced a period of reputable nice asian Economic Growth for the countrys diverse population millions of muslims hindus buddhists and christians living side by side. His life achievements were recognised the opening session of the home 429000. During his acceptance speech he did not hold back from expressing his views on the modern world. Is confronted be think these concerns. Did they both be of google economy growth indefeasible writing for nature political social and environmental challenges. In Southeast Asia then decided to work as a group and then. He and prosperity dr mahathir also discussed the state of the Global Economy and its interconnectedness we dont believe in playing sanctions to force countries to accept certain a good deal that you and to change governments. It is not only the particular country. But all the partners also we will stop economy killing in a we it is a form of dictatorship addicted to cheap that is worse and that in that kind it is international. And before the World Leaders attending the ceremony he also talked about his countrys foreign policy. He said friendly countries. We want to be friends with everyone and they me of than. One albeit that exception. Our population is too small to provide a good market. We need the Global Market here and many other laws a big market when the us aint here need to play against it and. Not for the imposition of the union lead to st hidden by the us again. But its the malaysian Prime Minister going to step down in 2020 and who would he endorsed to be his successor these are some of the questions malaysias Prime Minister. In this special edition talked to syria to her for 29000. 00. Times samis aid and syria presenter from Aljazeera International its my absolute pleasure to be here with you today my pleasure to be here as well with his excellency told dr Mahathir Mohamad the Prime Minister of malaysia where as we begin an interview thank you very much for talking to our desire 1st of all a pleasure to be here with you. Youve accepted now this is a chief meant award and i want to delve back into some of the highlights in your career you were nicknamed bump up hammer down and for those who are not familiar with that means the father of modernization its in reference of course to the dramatic transformation that took place in your country while you were Prime Minister i want to know though how you see yourself do you think malaysia could have made that a cheap 1000000 that transformation without you well in order to. Develop what the 1st need is for stability. I was is a multiracial nation and normally multiracial nations are not stable so the 1st job that i had to do was to make sure that all the different races Work Together for the country then of course that means of course that all the different races are represented in the government and they can speak for their own arrays and also for the nation and because everybody has a fair share in the governance of the country they feel said that their problems will be taken gail and that leads to is to be where development becomes possible but many countries have tried that approach malaysia has been more successful than some just to give an example malaysias g. D. P. Upon independence was comparable to ghana for example but today its around 6 times higher surely they have been are the secrets to this success well the secret is that when you please as a leader in that and he you must have some ideas you might have some ideas glean the throne watching what happens in other countries and. We decided that is it or look us we should look east because in the east we find countries like japan korea and the like and these seem to have been able to overcome their difficulties and develop their country so look east become similes in policy and that has contributed much there was our Development One of the things your renowned for is a crucial decision you made during the 1997 asian crisis not to follow the i. M. F. Prescriptions. And it turned out well for malaysia in the end malaysia transition that crisis quicker than some of the other countries that did follow the International Advice i want to know what made you decide to take a Bold Decision and and break ranks with others well for a year i watched the countries being devalued and and then as very poor we thought of all kinds of solutions but not being finance here not being an economy. Greed. Does not prevent me from this group not prevent me from accepting ridiculous ideas or ideas that are not common did you ever have any doubts i must have been a difficult decision to make while you was afraid to dream decision that meet the war. But i thought that you would work then well we had to take the reach an we plunged into the sea and fortunately for us. From depreciate the because we read and from then then on was malaysia recovered do you think the i. M. F. Still continues to give sometimes the wrong advice to countries well theyre. Really agreed that what they did was right and i hope that there will not be. Conventional as to always recommend the normal thing in the or. Expected thing. How was your time in politics changed you not just as a politician but as a human being. Well he said to resign ive been in corrupt government for 22 years thinking their young people should take over and i went to retire really but after some time lots of people came and asked me please do something about whats happening in the country and eventually i had to do something and then he was coming back the head of state once told me that no matter how principled you start out in politics at some point you are going to have to as he put it down so with the devil do you agree with that have have you ever had to make decisions which havent sat 100 percent comfortably with your conscience well when you are ignorant but the normal things then you can do to be abnormal things saw in times of course i get frightened with my own decisions but you had that out something in order to solve any should it seems not being sort of through conventional means so you never had to make decisions that you i mean do you have any regrets do you do you feel like this something you would have done differently. There are things that i feel because during my time i mean decisions the which i thought would solve the problem by and then theyre found that it was not effective. What achievement are you most proud of and what would you consider to be that biggest mistake. Well there in our country there. But they are not developing equally. In. They. Search for wealth sample and i thought that the problem of. Of culture of value system so i tried to change their belief system of the ethnic group behind but i feel in that effort. Looking forward to the k. L. Summit the kuala lumpur summit youre the chairman of it what must the kale summit achieve in december 2019 you know order for it to be a success. I have been watching the developments in the muslim world almost almost in countries are not considered as developed not a single one and then we see a lot of. Troubles in many muslim countries we. Are fairly fairly years of governance and also they have been fighting each other and there have been people from mostly in countries have run away from their own countries to seek security in other countries so these are major problems and many of them have been expelled from their country around it and thought keely and. These are the problems we really have to understand why is it happening and if we know why maybe we can find some solution for solutions of the nature youre talking about when it comes to uneven Development One would have to look deeper into some of the countries you are referring to which according to International Statistics and report indicate a level of mismanagement lack of democracy. Uneven access to resources can there really be a renaissance can you even an address that properly in a summit without tackling some of these issues. Well in the 1st place we need to understand the problem we need to see the background of the problem do you think the leaders of the muslim world understand that problem do you think the leaders of some of those countries who are attending the kale summit truly understand the problem the ive talked with them personally. When i met them and this scene they have the same concern as as many other Muslim Leaders and i think its about time we see down seriously to look at this problem and to find solutions do you think the launch of the kale summit in itself is an indication of the failure of other initiatives like the oh i see. It well there will be grouping of 52. 00 countries. When we have too many people the finally some consensus becomes very difficult but we through only 5 countries is much easier to think youll be more effective. Youve also commented on some of the Global Trends going on in the world today i wonder if i can get you to talk a little bit more about them specifically about the issue of trade wars which you mentioned do you think the u. S. And china have been too rigid in how theyve approached trade issues well 3 wars do not solve anything the only and they can last people and other people not to believe that the war. So i think all conflicts with the nation should be said through new good season arbitration or a court of law that is how hes problem of being clean with india is the bridge but are they failing in that regard the u. S. And china are they being too rigid in their stances theyre taking right now but there is too much politics involved not the economy sensing if you follow the economy rules i am learned in economies. Perhaps you can solve the problem in much better way then confrontation and claim to. Destroy each other right and you also mentioned multilateralism and the rise of the right are you comfortable with the direction that the Current Us Administration the trumpet ministration is leading the world in with regard to multilateral action. Well see i. Bet that what you do us doing is being now is the right thing. Becoming very national nationalists is good but not at the expense of other people we believe that every country should care itself but that being. Needing to be protected or secure all thats not been confronting our this is better if we learn to Work Together in a multilateral world because wherever a big country does it he defects other countries. The poor countries so that is not a solution we were going along with it was martin. But now nationalism still they affect many countries and the more right they did then they were left or even. As before you also mention sanctions on iran will you be rallying taking trying to take action to mitigate encounter the us unilateral u. S. Sanctions on iran. Well our seas a very small economy by comparison to the u. S. We have it the surplus with the u. S. Obviously we dont like the idea of sanctions so what we can do is just to preach their values of. Peaceful resolution to conflicts rather than confrontation sanctions and the like. You. You also mention the issue of retirement and for any leader no matter how great a round theyve had in office one of the issues that comes up is when they will leave the political stage of what will happen next one of the questions thats burning right now in the malaysian media as being talked and discussed about a lot is whether 2020 will be the last year for dr Mahathir Mohamad as Prime Minister of malaysia will it be. Which probably. 2020 be the year in which you decide to exit the office of Prime Minister. Well we had a vision to become a fully developed country by the year 2020 unfortunately our desk said step down the leadership took a different cause different policies and that caused the the target not to be achieved in 2020 so what we have said before is that we will still be trained by we have moved. A complete be frontin to 22. 00 within 20252030 days a new approach to solving our economy problem and this time around we want everybody to benefit and not any particular group only so if i understand correctly you feel the need the country needs your leadership well beyond 2020. Well i have promised that i would step down. Resolve some more immediate problems that has been left by the previous government. And we said i will step down and. Their leadership do well and can they did there has been a need by the coalition talking about issues that need to be resolved can you say 2020 will be the year that the sedition law the security offenses act will be repealed some of the tools that were used by previous Previous Administration to suppress Civil Liberties of course the Ruling Coalition your Ruling Coalition. It campaigned on a platform to scrap some of these but theres been criticism that you havent moved quick enough will 2020 be the year in which some of these tools will be repressed. Repealed rather. The problems were very big very serious you can achieve success in our efforts to overcome the problems overnight it takes time we are given a cherry 5 years to accomplish this object object but in the 1st year when there are years now we have so many of the problem for example the huge boring by the previous government should meet as banka but we managed to overcome them because we manage the finances of the country much better than before we are also still very stable as a nation despite the fact that there is this sudden change of government we should limited for the past 60 years normally when the easy. Course is disruption there would be demonstration industry there would be. Demand even be violence but the militia this speech for under previous government the new government when off very smoothly which is something we didnt expect because we had never experienced changes of government so to that extent we have done fairly well i would claim but there are other areas were example we found that corruption was the one that brought down the previous government we have taken steps to the extent that d. No one complains about corruption the me complain about delays in making decisions and all that but the lease of course happens when the new government takes over and right your have made i think even your critics will agree that youve made a lot of progress but still specifically there are some issues can you give a timeline for for scrapping some of those. Law as i mentioned and for passing the bill called the independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission which the opposition is pushing for can you say 2020 s. When you get Civil Liberties in order there are some laws which need to be. Device or amended but some of these laws are there but theyre. Practically guaranteed by the. Constitution of the country if we have to change the laws we need to get that comes to teaching of that and also. Allowing us to do need or at least making changes there enable us to change the laws but the constitution requires a 2 thirds majority our government has not got the majority we need to depend upon to all position but position of course is not very forthcoming do you think the leader of the Ruling Coalition on whatever him is the best person to take over at some point would you endorse him. Well i cannot get into the what would be the best person to take you over because i have had bad experience i have named my successes and when they took over to do Different Things do you have any regrets about i mean youve had a lot say off and on relationship with Anwar Ibrahim any regrets about how that has transpired over her before because we were. And think this is the. Bad were there less that countries needs is more important in there now will you or personal feelings so we decided to forget the past and consent to read on developing the country that is more important than our quadrilles. Dr Mahathir Mohamad thank you very much for talking to others. I. End this life the most incredible stories are often true. And sharing dont experience whose. Makes the on from you know for me. In this life diversity makes a difference understanding the importance of being part of something much greater than ourselves in this life what i want to use is freedom of expression. The right to want to. Sean and going on into the darkness. Because you dislike the desire to understand the will. Make sure she. And the human condition is universal. However a good part of Central China there is that quiet settled subdued under these winter. And that produces long lived mist or fog if you really unlucky poor air quality not everybody is that unlucky now the climate is all building across here from children eastwards some rain on its northern flank is the colder air so that snow along it. Really yanks the valley its rain and this in the case i think not increasing the likelihood of far longer lasting for hong kong or at 25 degrees seems quite a pleasant. Sunny situation with the northeast monsoon in now its trailing current i will not get most of the right and thats reflected in satellite picture the case no trough that comes through showers in the northeast have just happened in the forecast we see very little else right in the funnel seems to be in the market something in new delhi things across the same stories in china theres not leaving culti will decrease and you know new delhi is prone to that but the next band of disruptions on its way through pakistan touches streaky ahead of it thats all went by and the disruption is currently rain in iraq its come down to the gulf from this is position i think during tuesday. On counting the cost of i. M. F. Low tax cuts for big businesses at asteras the for the poor is just the perfect cocktail for street protests speak to the Vice President of ecuador can be as cash crunch the competition lining up to take netflix is. Counting the cost on aljazeera. The fact. More of us on the planet money could soon be lost. With an International Team of scientists is determined not to make that happen without intervention to give the cuba i would say here to have vast amounts of race against time to try and frame each. Like a crisis thats in the magic. Extinction tag known on aljazeera. We understand the differences and the similarities of cultures across the world. So no matter where you call home aljazeera will bring in the news and Current Affairs that matter to you. Aljazeera. This is aljazeera. Follow the Angela Macdonald this is the news hour live from doha coming up in the next 60 minutes taking tribute to the fallen leaders in west africa appeal for more help to battle im good now the u. N. Is getting involved. University students across india voiced their anger against a controversial new citizenship law
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