‘I SAW PART OF THE CATASTROPHE COMING BUT I DIDN’T EXPECT IT TO BE SO CALAMITOUS’: NAJIB NOW EATS HIS WORDS, ADMITS ‘CLEVER’ MAHATHIR ‘KNEW THE SYSTEM’ AFTER REPEATEDLY DENIGRATING HIM AS A SENILE 93-YEAR-OLD

Going into the 14th general election, former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak said he expected to BN to lose several seats, but did not expect such a disastrous outcome for the coalition that had governed the country since Independence.

“I saw part of it coming. I didn’t expect it to be this catastrophic. I thought we could possibly lose some seats, but I didn’t expect this sort of dramatic result, this calamitous result.

“It was a traumatic experience for us, as you can imagine. For a party that has been established for more than 60 years in power.

“The history of Malaysia is basically the history of Umno and BN,” he said in an interview with Reuters.

BN only won 79 parliamentary seats in the 222-member Dewan Rakyat in the May 9 general election, down from 133 previously.

The coalition disintegrated after the disastrous defeat, with nine of the 13 component parties quitting to form their own coalitions.

The remnants of BN are now left with just 57 seats in Parliament.

‘Dr M knew the system’

Najib blamed BN’s defeat on the allegations that the then opposition levelled against BN.

“They (opposition) came up with very scurrilous allegations to defame me and the government.

“Unfortunately after a period of time, it changed public opinion,” he said.

Najib also said that Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who led Pakatan Harapan to Putrajaya, was “clever” in his strategy.

“He knew BN, he knew the civil service. He knew everything about the system, so he operated from within and from without, so that had a distinct advantage.

“He was quite clever in a way, that he summarised everything in very simple terms, and repeated ad nauseam the same same thing over and over again.

“The other point that I felt in a way bad about is that we didn’t lose to a superior agenda,” he said.

– M’kini