“We will review this appointment. It is not carved in stone. We can change our stand,” he said at a press conference after the Pakatan Harapan (PH) presidential council meeting.
He said many people have offered their views on the appointment, and the PH government is always sensitive to the people’s views.
Maszlee is the third education minister to be named president of the university since its establishment more than three decades ago.
A former student and later a lecturer at the university, he replaced former minister Rais Yatim as the seventh IIU president.
The post has also been held by PKR president-elect Anwar Ibrahim, who was the education minister when he took over from Hussein Onn, the university’s founding president. Anwar was replaced by then education minister Najib Razak following his sacking as deputy prime minister in 1998.
Maszlee’s appointment was criticised by a DAP leader who said it was a conflict of interest and against the minister’s pledge not to interfere in the management of institutions of higher learning.
Kampung Tunku assemblyman from Selangor, Lim Yi Wei, said Maszlee should decline the appointment, and warned against any attempt to defend the appointment using technical loopholes.
Other matters which Mahathir addressed during the press conference were:
Minimum wage
Mahathir said there were those who believed the minimum wage should be set at RM1,800 and others at RM1,500, but he pointed out that the country was experiencing difficult times at present.
“A lot of money we are supposed to have is being used to pay off debts. On top of that, the interest is high. We cannot increase government expenditure. We are competing with other countries.
“If our cost increases, we will lose our competitive edge,” he said.
PAS-Umno relations
Mahathir said the two parties were now coming out in the open about their cooperation, which they had hidden before.
“They have been cooperating previously, just in the room. Now they are out of the room, so we know. When they were in the room, we also knew,” he said.
On the RM9.5 million paid by former prime minister Najib Razak to lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah for leading the prosecution of Anwar Ibrahim in the Sodomy 2 case, Mahathir said Najib had done many wrong things, and the government has to choose what it should deal with first.
“There are already two charges framed against him. But there are many others.
“Investigations take a long time, simply because sometimes we do not get the full cooperation of those who know the facts, and sometimes it is difficult to get the documents to back the allegations made,” he said.
On capping share ownership in media companies
Mahathir said this was one of the ways to prevent the media from being manipulated by certain people.
“Wherever we go, we find that there are those who wish to control the media for their own interest. So we have decided to reduce these shares. But we have not done it yet,” he said.