PETALING JAYA: Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has denounced the former Barisan Nasional government for still relying on what he calls tactics of racial and religious politicking even after the coalition was defeated in the May 9 polls.

In his address on “The 100 Days of the Pakatan Harapan Government” broadcast over TV1 last night, the Prime Minister said the new government had strived over 100 days to change the “kleptocracy, a thieving government”.

“However, after losing, Barisan still tried to complicate the situation by harping on racial and religious politics, and even attempted to drag in the Rulers so as to incite hatred against the Pakatan Harapan government.

“Every appointment to key positions in the government was condemned in the name of race and religion. They forget that when they appointed officers, they had emphasised undivided support for their party,” he said in his pre-recorded speech.

In further hard-hitting comments against Barisan, Dr Mahathir also said that the former government had formulated laws to make them invulnerable, by attacking and suppressing their adversaries without valid reasons.

He also said the newspapers and media owned by the previous regime had been used to “cover up their misconduct and lies”.

“After Pakatan took over the government, we found that the damage they had done was far worse than what we had anticipated.

“All departments were intimidated and used by them to conduct their party activities and not to administer the country well. Their debt totalled a trillion ringgit, a figure unheard of before.

“But, arrogantly, they denied that they had done such damage. Unashamedly, they admitted that the traced millions of ringgit were for their party.

“How they came into so much money was never explained,” he said.

The chairman of Pakatan and Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia added that under the new government, the philosophy of “cash is king” was effectively terminated as cash could only become king when one has a lot of it.

He said a political party that had such a large amount of money could have only gained it by thieving means.

“The huge burden left behind by the previous government is the trillion-ringgit debt. Just repaying the interest can bankrupt us, what more repaying the principal sum.

“Talking about the wrongs of the previous government will take days.

“Therefore, we will focus on the promises made in our (election) manifesto,” he said.

Dr Mahathir also noted that the Pakatan government’s commitment to good governance and a Malaysia free of corruption is reflected in the realisation of 21 of the 60 promises in its 14th General Election manifesto.

The premier said the government wanted Malaysia to be known for integrity and not corruption, and the efforts taken over the past 100 days were not made in isolation.

“The government believes that in the future, the consolidation of the national institutions will ensure that there is no corruption, abuse of power and theft of money and public property and, if these happen, they will not escape legal action,” he said.