In a blog posting, the communications and multimedia minister said Mahathir was clutching at straws with his lawsuit.

‎”Mahathir tried to topple the prime minister through Umno. He failed.

“Mahathir tried a parliamentary vote of no confidence. He failed.”

Salleh said Mahathir would also fail in his latest attempt as his accusations were false.

He added that Mahathir had run out of options and the suit showed he had no political channels left.

Earlier today, it was reported that Mahathir and two other vocal critics of Najib, Khairuddin Abu Hassan and Anina Saadudin, filed a suit against the PM over claims of abuse of power in office.

In their statement of claim, the trio said they were among the rightful parties to take the action against Najib.

They also traced the chronology back to March 2015 on 1MDB investigations, the formation of a special task force, then Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail’s dismissal and the sacking of former Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin.

The trio’s lawyer, Haniff Khatri Abdulla, filed the lawsuit at the Kuala Lumpur High Court this morning.

They are seeking a declaration that Najib had abused his official position as the country’s leader and Umno president by deliberately obstructing investigations on 1MDB, RM42 million from SRC International and the RM2.6 billion political donation.