COMMENT | Dr Mahathir Mohamad's mask slipped last week. So, when will he stop stoking the fires between the different religions and races, and just slither gracefully into retirement?

His supporters are just as bad. They forget that he is a divisive influence and a master manipulator and they ignore his selective amnesia, like the time he claimed he could not recall if he was in Malaysia, or Beijing, when the order to attack Memali was given in November 1985

Mahathir is not the only Malaysian leader who fails to realise that his deeds, and words, have consequences.

When a missile fails to hit its intended target, falls short of the objective and hits a village, ordinary people are injured or killed, and their property destroyed. After French President Emmanuel Macron criticised Islamic radicals for their terrorist acts, Mahathir's remark was like a rocket attack that failed to hit its target. Mahathir's gaffe has caused Malaysians to be treated with suspicion in most parts of the civilised world.

Some Malaysians working and living abroad said that their friends and work colleagues wanted to know what Mahathir meant by his reckless tweet, in which he said, "Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past".

A former civil servant berated me for censuring Mahathir and said...