Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said the government would be able to save at least 30 per cent of the administration’s current expenditure if corruption was eliminated. — Picture by Firdaus Latif

PETALING JAYA, June 10 — The government would be able to save at least 30 per cent of the administration’s current expenditure if corruption was eliminated, Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said today.

“We will not be like the last regime where corruption is carried out right at the top and subordinates condoning such acts of corruption since their superiors were practicing it... that is for certain this time.

“We are going to be strict, which means some people will suffer, but we have to pay the price to eradicate corruption in the country,” he said during a dinner speech with Malaysians living in Japan today.

Dr Mahathir, who is here specifically for the 24th International Conference on the Future of Asia, or Nikkei Conference, is accompanied on his two-day visit by his wife Tun Dr Siti Hasmah Mohd Ali and Foreign Ministry officials.

He said he was aware eradicating corruption was not an easy task but promised to do his best as several measures have already been taken by the federal government a month after the General Election.

“The more we (government) examine everything thoroughly, we discover money have used inappropriately, stolen, or sheltered away somewhere.

“Someone told me fishes rot at the head when its dead, I will make sure there is no more rotten fish at the head during our administration,” he said after citing the Finance Ministry’s discovery of dubious payments made in two pipeline projects, with nearly 90 per cent of the contracts worth RM9.4 billion being paid out but only 13 per cent of the work being completed.

Dr Mahathir also reminisced the time when the government and private sector worked as one body under the Malaysia Incorporated Policy introduced in 1981, saying he was determined to treat the business communities as friends and not enemies as he wants to go back to working with the private sector to rebuild the country.

“We want to do things quickly, we want to approve things quickly but we do not want any hanky panky and there will be tenders for every government contracts with fairness.

“Should someone receives a contract from the government, that said person must carry out its obligations and selling it to another person will nullified the contract,” he said.