Mahathir bin Mohamad is a Malaysian politician, statesman, author and doctor. He served as the 4th and 7th Prime Minister of Malaysia from July 1981 to October 2003 and again from May 2018 to March 2020. He was the first prime minister not to represent the Barisan Nasional coalition and also the first to serve from two different parties and on non-consecutive terms.
About Mahathir Mohamad in brief
Mahathir bin Mohamad is a Malaysian politician, statesman, author and doctor. He served as the 4th and 7th Prime Minister of Malaysia from July 1981 to October 2003 and again from May 2018 to March 2020. He was the first prime minister not to represent the Barisan Nasional coalition and also the first to serve from two different parties and on non-consecutive terms. At the time of his resignation, during the 2020 Malaysian political crisis in February 2020, he was the oldest currently-serving state leader. Mahathir was born at his parents’ home in a poor neighbourhood at Lorong Kilang Ais, Alor Setar, the capital of the Malay sultanate of Kedah, which was then a British protectorate. His paternal grandfather had come from a Malay-Malay ancestry as his grandfather originated in Pakistan. His maternal grandfather was from a Swatati tribe of Pashtun tribe of Balakrra Village, Pashtuns. He is the son of Wan Tempawan Wan Hanapi and Mohang Iskar, who were both Malay and of partly Indian ancestry. He married a woman from Kerala and has five children. He has been a physician since the 1960s and served as Malaysia’s Prime Minister from 1981 to 2003. His political career has spanned more than 70 years, starting with his participation in protests against non-Malays gaining Malaysian citizenship during the Malayan Union. In 2016, he quit UMNO-BN in light of its support for the actions of Prime Minister Najib Razak, in spite of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad scandal.
Later that year, the Malaysian United Indigenous Party was officially registered as a political party, with Mahathirs as chairman. In 2018, Mahathor was announced as the Pakatan Harapan coalition candidate for prime minister for the 2018 general election, in a plan to pardon Anwar Ibrahim and hand a role to him if the campaign was successful. After leaving office, he became a strident critic of his hand-picked successor Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and later Najb Razak. He died in Malaysia in February 2019. He had a son, Mohan, who is a doctor and a former Malaysian deputy prime minister. He also has a daughter, Zainal Abidin, who was born in 1963 and is also a former Prime Minister. His son is currently a Malaysian Member of Parliament for Langkawi. He previously served as a Minister of Education from 1974 to 1978 and Minister of Trade and Industry from 1978 to 1981. He became Deputy Prime Minister in 1976 and was sworn in as prime minister after the resignation of his predecessor, Hussein Onn, in 1981. During his first tenure as PM, Malaysia experienced a period of rapid modernization and economic growth, and his government initiated a series of bold infrastructure projects. However, his accumulation of power came at the expense of judicial independence and the traditional powers and privileges of Malaysia’s royalty. He used the controversial Internal Security Act to detain activists, non-mainstream religious figures, and political opponents.
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