NAJIB Razak was “insane” when he explained what “cash is king” meant by saying the “king” referred to “the people”, Dr Mahathir Mohamad said.

The nonagenarian leader, who has used the “cash is king” phrase against Najib numerous times in accusing him of corruption, was commenting on what Najib said during the televised debate with PKR president Anwar Ibrahim last week.

Astro Awani quoted Dr Mahathir saying that Najib had “lied many times”, including in the Dewan Rakyat.

“I am puzzled why Najib was given a platform to lie, to speak as if he was insane, (by saying) cash is king, king is the people,” Dr Mahathir, who is the Langkawi MP, was reported telling the media in Langkawi.

“Before this, he also said he had no need to feel shame because he is the boss, boss did not steal anything. So in Parliament, he could say that we (the country) does not need to pay a sen of (1Malaysia Development Berhad) debts.

“But that’s not true, we have to pay billions of ringgit… if he says we do not need to pay (debts), it is not true.”

The Najib-Anwar debate was on the subject of whether the government should bail out oil and gas company Sapura Energy Berhad as well as the country’s economy.

Najib had defended his administration’s move to give cash assistance to people, which Dr Mahathir had criticised when campaigning during the 14th general election in 2018, which saw Najib and the Barisan Nasional (BN) removed from federal power.

At the time, Dr Mahathir had frequently used the term “cash is king” to describe how the cash handouts were used to get voters to support BN.

The term was also an allusion to money politics Dr Mahathir had accused BN of using. – May 16, 2022.