PUTRAJAYA, Feb 24 (NNN-BERNAMA) — Dr Mahathir Mohamad Monday resigned as the prime minister and chairman of Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Bersatu).
The Prime Minister’s Office announced in a statement that Dr Mahathir submitted his letter of resignation as the prime minister to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong.
“Dr Mahathir bin Mohamad submitted his letter of resignation as the Prime Minister of Malaysia today. The letter was sent to the Malaysian King Yang di-Pertuan Agong at 1 pm,” the statement said.
Dr Mahathir was sworn in as the country’s seventh prime minister on May 10, 2018, after leading the Pakatan Harapan (PH) charge to remove what he called a kleptocratic government.
With his resignation as the prime minister Monday, the four-party PH government coalition has practically collapsed.
Dr Mahathir had submitted his letter of resignation as the Bersatu chairman to the party headquarters, according to a statement from the office of the Bersatu chairman.
Bersatu has also pulled out of the PH coalition.
Its president, Muhyiddin Yassin, said in a statement that the decision to leave the coalition was made at a special meeting of the party’s top leaders Sunday.
Dr Mahathir’s resignations as prime minister and Bersatu chairman caught everyone by surprise as he had repeatedly said he wanted to stay on as the PM until after Malaysia hosts the APEC meeting in November.
The precursor of today’s dramatic announcements was the PH Presidential Council meeting last Friday which was reported to be a heated affair over the matter of the promised power transition.
However, Dr Mahathir told a press conference afterwards that the meeting decided that he had the final say over when to step down after the APEC meeting.
Sunday, however, political parties from both sides of the divide were huddled in separate meetings as speculation mounted of the possible formation of a new coalition government with different partners.
