Najib flouting Umno's democratic tradition, decries Dr M

Former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad lamented that Umno president Najib Abdul Razak is not following the footsteps of past party presidents who allowed the democratic process for smooth transition of party leadership and supported the right of members to air dissent and debate their performance.

"All transitions of leadership in Umno went smoothly and democratically. Najib should have followed the same way and allow members to be heard and debates to be freely held on his performance," said the ex-premier in his blog post.

Mahathir argued that when Umno was founded, democracy was chosen as its administrative model, which is also the model used by the country to allow for smooth transition of power both in the party and for the nation.

"With only the vote of members, leaders can be toppled or raised," he said.

Mahathir noted that when Onn Jaafar wanted to open the party to non-Malays but found his proposal rejected, he resigned and Tunku Abdul Rahman took over. Onn never tried to remain in power.

Similarly, faced with poor performance in the 1969 elections, Tunku then stepped down after realising he is no longer popular with Umno members. The transition was smooth, he pointed out.

Mahathir added that the same was true when Razaleigh Hamzah and Musa Hitam challenged his leadership, while admitting that the following developments split Umno into two teams - his Team A and Razaleigh's Team B.

However, he said things was still settled democratically via party polls, no one was barred from airing their views.

Such, he argued was also the case when ex-PM Abdullah Badawi was convinced to step down from the Umno presidency and as PM by none other than Najib himself.

Mahathir said that Najib should follow in the footsteps of the past Umno leaders, though he lamented that the PM seemed to have other ideas.

He accused Najib of using his powers as party president to stifle dissent and take his detractors out of circulation, as well as abusing the powers of the PM's office to keep his grip on power, effectively overriding democracy itself in both the party and the country.

This, said Mahathir is why extraordinary action from outside the party is needed, as the voice of the members to determine party leadership – as how it was intended to be - is no longer working because of Najib's stifling actions.

Unlikely alliances with strange bedfellows need to be formed, urged Mahathir, to unseat Najib before things turn worse.

"As the voices of Umno and its members are stifled by Najib and they cannot do anything about it, then the rakyat, outside of Umno including opposition parties, must join together to form a strong alliance and unseat him," said the former PM, noting that all can see the harm that Najib is inflicting to the nation.

Mahathir warned that Najib will play up the news of him working with former nemesis DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang, to divert attention from the real purpose of the movement, just as the Bersih 4.0 pro-electoral reform rally was peppered with allegations that the Chinese are trying to topple a Malay government.

The Bersih 4.0 rally was painted in racial tones after much ado was made about its racial composition, detractors pointing out that is was attended mainly by Chinese.

A pro-government 'red-shirt' rally made up of a predominantly Malay crowd was also held to protest the pro-electoral reform rally.

The ex-premier has been on a crusade to oust Najib after the 1MDB and RM2.6 billion scandals came to light, vowing to drive his once-chosen PM-candidate out of office. -Mkini