Dr Mahathir Mohamad should be held responsible for the damage inflicted on Malaysia's reputation, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's press aide said today.

Tengku Sharifuddin Tengku Ahmad was responding to Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir who confirmed that the donation to Najib was genuine and nothing was expected in return.

The aide also criticised the Western media for allowing themselves to be used by those with a political agenda.

"Western media who allowed themselves to be used to propagate false politically-motivated allegations should apologise to the Malaysian people," he added in a media statement.

Tengku Sharifuddin said the Saudi minister's remarks confirmed what Najib had maintained on the RM2.6 billion donation and the findings of multiple lawful agencies.

'Mahathir's lies motivated by personal interest'

"This also proves that the wild allegations, pushed for one year by Mahathir and his anti-Najib campaign, are completely false.

"Mahathir's lies were motivated by personal interest, not out of care for Malaysia or the people.

"It was an attempt to use deception to unseat a democratically-elected government, just to save the political career of Mahathir's son, Mukhriz," he added.

Attorney-general Mohamed Apandi Ali had on Jan 26 cleared Najib of any wrongdoing in relation to investigations into the SRC International Sdn Bhd and the RM2.6 billion deposited into the prime minister's personal bank accounts.

Apandi also revealed that RM2.03 billion was later returned to the donor, who is a Saudi prince.

However, Mahathir continued to accuse the prime minister of wrongdoing in this matter, despite Najib repeatedly denying abusing public funds for personal gain.