The Home Ministry is still dithering over the release of 800 copies of a critical book by former Asian Wall Street Journal editor Barry Wain, entitled ‘Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times’.

hishammuddin hussein 160310 pc at parliament Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein told the Dewan Rakyat last Friday that the book "was found to have insulted the national leadership and the institution of Malay rulers”.

"If it is found that the book does not go against the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984, there is no reason for the government to prevent the book to be allowed into the country.”

The copies have been sitting on a loading dock in Port Klang since November. In the meantime, bookstores in Singapore have been doing a land-office business in the book, which has since gone through several more printings.

Some 12,500 hardback copies have been sold at S$49.90 (RM115.10), 11,000 of these in Singapore. The book was on the Sunday Times bestseller list for 11 weeks, dropping out only last week.

"This is pretty extraordinary considering that it is a serious, political book..., while most of the other big-selling non-fiction books are feel-good or lifestyle tracts such as ‘Have a Little Faith’ by Mitch Albom," said a source.

Also available through Amazon and other online booksellers, the book is a critical but fair account of Mahathir's 22 years in power.

It postulates that as much as US$40 billion (RM100 billion at the exchange rate at the time) was lost to Malaysia through corruption or grandiose schemes that came to nothing.

NONE Wain wrote that Mahathir "relentlessly badgered, berated and browbeat Malaysians, especially Malays, to shape up and convert his dreams into reality”.

“If necessary, he would crucify his opponents, sacrifice allies and tolerate monumental institutional and social abuses to advance his project."

Like Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore and Indonesia's Suharto, " Mahathir integrated his country deeply with the western economies and achieved an enviable development record".

During a visit to Washington DC, during which Mahathir met President Ronald Reagan, Defence Secretary Caspar Weinberger and  others, he secretly launched an innocuous sounding Bilateral Training and Consultation Treaty, wrote Wain.

This was described as a series of working groups for exercises, intelligence sharing, logistical support and general security issues.

It was also claimed that, even as Mahathir displayed public antipathy towards Americans on general principle, his jungle back home was crawling with US troops quietly training for jungle warfare.

Customs procedures

Mahathir responded in his blog to Wain’s charges on the financial loss to Malaysia, saying he supports a royal commission of inquiry being established to establish the truth of the claim.

NONE "Barry Wain must provide documentary proof of any sum that he alleged I had burned. I will co-operate fully with the commission,” Mahathir wrote.

“Depending upon the result of the commission, I reserve the right to sue Barry Wain, (DAP leader) Lim Kit Siang and Malaysiakini for libel for a sum to be disclosed later. If the government is withholding the book... I would request that the book be released forthwith. I am not in need of government protection.”

Foreign published books which are air-freighted into Malaysia often go through customs without being checked, or with only a cursory check at the airport.

Books sent by ships or by land from Singapore are often stopped for inspection which can mean customs officers spending weeks reading the material.

But sometimes they just sit on the book, leaving the publisher with little option but to withdraw it or be faced with being hit with storage charges, leaving the book effectively banned without the government having to face criticism for formally banning it.

 

This article first appeared in the Asia Sentinel .