October 17, 2006

Why Mahathir hated Australia

Eric Ellis, Putrajaya

It's been three years since the recalcitrant Mohamed Mahathir left office, but he still has strong opinions, on North Korea, Israel, Iraq and, of course, Australia

Dr Mahathir Mohamed's anti-Australianness was a phenomenon that bedevilled Australian diplomats in the decades after he became Malaysian prime minister in 1981. Mahathir's vision of a perfect world had Australia nowhere in the picture. His was a messianic mission to resist Australian integration in the region, even when Canberra actually wanted to, most notably during the Keating term. Australia may have easily been the biggest economy in a neighbourhood desperate for capital but Mahathir, as Asia's most persuasive champion, noisily campaigned to exclude Canberra from the region's key conversations. It was only after he stepped down three years ago that Canberra got the invites it long coveted.

So what was behind Mahathir's grudge? In 1993 during the "recalcitrant" drama with Paul Keating, an Australian diplomat in Kuala Lumpur told me Mahathir's beef was rooted in a slight Canberra had unwittingly made when he was a rising politician in the 1970s. After Mahathir had published his controversial tome The Malay Dilemma in 1970 - his take on the problems facing Malaysia's ethnic Malays ( bumiputra) in their homeland - Canberra had marked Mahathir as worth cultivating, inviting him to Australia on a special visitors' program. As the story goes, Mahathir couldn't make the dates proposed. He asked to defer a few months but a jobsworth bureaucrat determined it was now or never - the budget wouldn't be available later. Mahathir was offended, the visit never happened and, petty though it sounds, he nurtured the grudge throughout his premiership.

Speaking to The Bulletin last week in his office in Putrajaya, the new Malaysian administrative capital he helped hew from the jungle south of Kuala Lumpur, Mahathir says the anecdote - which has wide currency in Australian-Malaysian relations - is nonsense. "I don't bear grudges the way people think I do. That sort of thing is too small for me."

He says his problem with Australia comes from Australians themselves, not from him. "What I cannot stand is this overbearing attitude from Australians that we in Asia are not doing things right. It was only Australia, in the whole region, that did this, always lecturing us. It still does it, off and on.

"This idea of pontificating, of trying to say that we, Australia, are the representatives of America and Europe, the deputy sheriff and we have to tell you when you have gone wrong. It's as if you Australians have never gone wrong yourself. Look at yourself first. That's what hurts me."

Mahathir says he tried to develop good relations with Australia early in his rule. "I was close to Bob Hawke. Initially I met Howard and talked to him and I thought we could get along, but there's never been any good remarks from Australia about Malaysia. To say we don't understand democracy, we don't understand justice. They give the impression that these wogs don't understand justice. This moral high ground, it doesn't go down well with us. I have always wanted Malaysia not to be submissive to anyone."

Mahathir gleefully tells a story about a recent wander through Melbourne's Prahran market, when he was accosted by a fellow shopper who recognised him. "He was very agitated and said, 'You come to Australia, you see how we treat you, it's not how you treated [once-jailed opposition leader] Anwar Ibrahim'. It was very rude and I said to him, 'You don't have any manners'. Then there were two people selling felafel; I thought they were Arab. They saw me, called me by name, 'Dr Mahathir, would you like to try some?' and I asked, 'Where are you from?' and he said Israel, and he was much nicer than this other fellow."

There's something of the circus performer about ageing, out-of-power leaders like Mahathir and his old sparring partner, Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew. They retreat to their retirement libraries, bored, never quite able to let go. The media arrive, toss a few provocative questions and off they go. It doesn't take much to wind "Dr M" up, for the old enmities come tumbling out, his venom as potent as ever. At home, it's got him into trouble with his hand-picked successor Abdullah Badawi, who Mahathir has mercilessly attacked this year for selling out Malaysia's sovereignty. The feud threatens to split the ruling UMNO party and Mahathir says he expects to be banned by UMNO.

Israel and the Jews is another pet Mahathir bugbear the years have not dissipated. It doesn't take long for it to come up in any Mahathir tour d'horizon. One of his last speeches as PM in 2003 was to the Organisation of Islamic Conference meeting in KL, where he held the chair. It was also one of his most controversial tirades, a speech that marked him forever as an anti-Semite. "Jews rule the world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them. Israel is the enemy allied with most powerful nations. We cannot fight them through brawn alone, we must use our brains."

Now that there's no votes in demonising Israel, surely a reflective retirement has softened his stance on Jews? Think again. "We can fight them in more ways than killing people," he says. "We can attack their economy, we can attack their standing in this world. Their finances can be attacked. What we see happening in the US is that this very small group, these Jews, about 8 million or so, they have control of the press, of the TV, in the US and outside, of Hollywood, and they have control of the finances [the world financial community]. They finance both parties." Mahathir says he recognises Israel's right to exist "but within its borders, not occupying the whole of Palestine as it is doing now".

Mahathir agrees that the world's newest member of the nuclear club, North Korea's Kim Jong-il, is erratic "but it is dishonest to say he is threatening the world. The threat to the world comes from the US. The US would make a wonderful policeman, but when the US becomes the judge, the prosecution, the executioner ... Yes, he has a bomb but what is going to do, lob it into South Korea? If he does that, the US will wipe North Korea from the map. People should reject this perpetual upgrading of weapons; we should do away with nuclear weapons. The war is no longer fought in the way of the past.

"American control of the media shapes the world's thinking. They pick a country as the axis of evil and people suddenly see horns growing. I've met [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad; Iran is a proud country, I don't think they want a war; they don't want to conquer neighbours. Threatening them will only make them want to defend themselves by whatever means they can.

"The US reaction to anything is to apply sanctions. The US is the threat to world peace. Sanctions against Iran have done nothing good except create hatred and anger. I am not anti-American, I am anti the government's policies right now. Both [Republican and Democratic parties] are equally bad. The reason for that is that they are very much of the Jewish lobby in the US and the domestic policy spills over into their foreign policy; they have to support Israel because if they don't, they will lose the election. It's been proven, anybody who says anything against Israel is out."

Mahathir says the US was at its most agreeable to Asia post-World War II, preventing a Japanese scorched-earth retreat, when it helped rebuild and secure the region. "Now they are very, very keen to resort to force. How can you make a country democratic by using force?" Duly, he says Washington's Iraq and Afghanistan adventures are doomed. "If you compare what Saddam did and what is happening in Iraq today, between two bad choices, I would prefer Saddam."

Its easy to criticise but does Mahathir, 22 years PM and who now runs a "leadership institute" dedicated to world peace and nurturing the powerful, have any solution? "The US has got itself into a real fix. If they leave Iraq now, there will be a vacuum that will cause civil war, and if they stay, it is also going to cause civil war. What have they gained after sacrificing 3000 of their own soldiers?"

Still, he says an upside is that Washington and Canberra's Iraqi quagmire means Iran is safe from US aggression. "They have learnt their lessons. Iran will be worse than Iraq. The Iranians are united; they will fight."