Speaking to FMT, Abdul Aziz Kaprawi said it was wrong for Mahathir to compare himself to former finance minister Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and former deputy prime minister Musa Hitam, who left Umno in the late 1980s and then worked against it.
Neither of the two ever held the positions of Prime Minister and Umno President, he said. “We Umno members fully supported him as the Number One for 22 years. And now, when he is no longer in power, he is working with the opposition to bring down Umno. We cannot accept that.”
Mahathir recently questioned why he was singled out and labeled a traitor for working with the opposition, noting that certain Umno leaders had done the same before.
Abdul Aziz, who is the Deputy Transport Minister, recalled that Mahathir had once described the DAP as a chauvinist and a racist party. “That’s why we call him a traitor,” he said.
He also pointed out that Mahathir once preached the importance of unwavering loyalty to the party’s president.
“The president is an institution,” Abdul Aziz said. “So whoever is the president, party members must be loyal to him. That is the principle of Umno. During his tenure as party president, everyone pledged support to him.”
He described Mahathir as a power hungry leader.
“From the very beginning of his involvement in politics, he was power hungry. During his tenure as deputy prime minister, he put a lot of pressure on Tun Hussein Onn, who was the prime minister at the time.
“Then during his own tenure as prime minister, he removed many deputies who had potential. He wanted to retain his power by sabotaging his potential successors.”
Abdul Aziz recalled Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s tenure as prime minister and Mahathir’s relentless effort to bring him down.
“When Badawi didn’t want to obey his advice, he put pressure on Badawi and then succesfully removed him.
“And now, when Najib Razak doesn’t want to succumb to him, he tries to bring Najib down. Because he could not do so from within Umno, he’s now trying to do it with the opposition.
“Umno members cannot accept that.”