100 ways, not 100 days

By Nur Jazlan (The Malaysian Insider)

JULY 13 — This past weekend Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak would have breathed a sigh of relief at crossing an important milestone of being in power for 100 days.

Coincidentally, that is exactly the amount of time that former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had given him before he began levelling criticisms at Najib.

And as we know, when the grand old man of Malaysian politics criticises, he can really cut you down to size, wielding his acid wit like a surgeon's scalpel that the medical doctor did not use in practise.

Dr Mahathir is keen to continue his virtual prime ministership after he stepped down in 2003.

He may want to criticise Najib for ignoring his opinions in the hope of bringing him down, like how he did in toppling his successor Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi but I hope he realises that his actions today will only benefit the pretenders to the throne and not himself or his family as demonstrated previously with Tunku Abdul Rahman and others.

I believe that Najib is the last hope Umno has to stem the rise of Pakatan Rakyat.

If he is able to return the confidence of the voters to Umno, then the party will have some time to reform and regenerate its new younger leadership.

If he fails then Umno will be doomed to follow the fate of Golkar in Indonesia today, a party that is in disarray after losing both the parliamentary and presidential polls.

While many people may feel that Najib has no cause to celebrate the milestone, I beg to differ.

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