UMNO must not be allowed to become the government again as that will pave the way to corruption, former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said today.

The Langkawi MP said the aim is to have a clean government while maintaining Malay control over Putrajaya.

“Our main objective in the next election is not to destroy the Malay dominance in the government but to change the government from a corrupt government to a clean government.

“To do that we must defeat Umno. Umno may be popular again because the Malays support Umno; if the Malays support Umno and (the party) wins, Umno will become a corrupt government.

“(The government) will be led by people who are corrupt. We must fight against Umno and defeat it and at the same time, realise we have to work closely with non-Malays but must be clean people not affected by corruption,” he said in an interview with radio station CityPlusFM this morning.

Dr Mahathir was Umno president for 22 years. He left the party twice over internal conflicts.

He left Umno the first time when Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was prime minister but later rejoined the the party when Najib Razak took over the helm.

He left Umno again when the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) scandal involving Najib broke.

The Kedah-born leader had said then that he would stand for election.

“I will be 97 or 98; I know I am old but I am lucky I have not lost my ability to interact with people. My party wants me to contest but I don’t think I should.

“But I will be supportive of my party, Pejuang. At this moment Pejuang is not associated with PH (Pakatan Harapan) or BN (Barisan Nasional). We are alone and we make sure our leaders are against corruption. We want to fight on our own, together with the people who are fed up with the country’s politics.

“Many of our leaders were in Umno when the country was in good shape; we want to bring back that kind of Malaysia with leaders who think about the country, not themselves,” he said.

Dr Mahathir today rejected calls for him to be the PM for a third time.

“I don’t think I should although I can still function. If you read my book, when I was the PM the second time, the work I did was much more than when I first became the PM. I worked 18 hours a day.

“To be PM again, the work is too heavy. Unfortunately, my party is very keen to have me as PM,” he said.

Dr Mahathir took the top office for the first time in 1981 and stepped down 22 years later in 2003. At the time of his departure, Umno was facing heavy loss of support from the people as a result of the Reformasi movement.

Fifteen years later and against all odds, Dr Mahathir was once again appointed to lead the country, this time with Pakatan Haparan. However, the PH administration managed to hold on to power for only 22 months. – January 5, 2022.