JAKARTA: Malaysia’s mercurial and virtually omnipotent Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad, on Saturday threw his country into turmoil by announcing his resignation from his party and the governing coalition, and thus the premiership, and then reversing the decision after an hour’s pleading by subordinates.

After the dust had settled at the annual congress of Mahathir’s party, the United Malays National Organization (UMNO), the move appeared little more than a ploy to strengthen his already extremely firm grip on power.

The unprecedented and totally unexpected declaration came at the end of Mahathir’s address to 2,000 UMNO loyalists in the capital, Kuala Lumpur.

Front coalition.

As the sobbing 76-year-old, who has ruled Malaysia for almost 21 years and is by far the most dominant leader in South East Asia, sat hunched in his chair on the stage, many of his closest aides, led by the Deputy Prime Minister, Abdullah Badawi, immediately pleaded with him to reconsider.

An hour later, a deputy reemerged and said, “after much persuasion from UMNO Supreme Council members and UMNO members, Dr Mahathir has agreed to withdraw his resignation.”

Opposition politicians and political analysts ridiculed Mahathir’s theatrics as political grandstanding. “It was just a cunning plan to mobilize support for himself,” said Dr Syed Husin Ali, the head of the Malaysian People’s party.

Professor Jomo Sundaram, of the University of Malaya, said it would have been hard for Mahathir to choreograph everyone’s tears but the sudden nature of the news raised many questions.

“If (as is widely believed) he is preparing for an orderly transition, he would have done it rather differently,” Sundaram said.

After a few years of seeing his support ebb noticeably, Mahathir’s position has strengthened significantly in the past 12 months. He has divided the opposition, surprised the nation by his party’s showing in two by-elections and won unexpected plaudits in Washington for his firm, albeit machiavellian, campaign against fundamentalism.

—Dawn/The Observer News Service.