Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad today emphasised the need to be multilingual and shared how he spoke a little Hokkien when he was practising medicine.

"It is good for you to know some Chinese. I was once practising as a doctor and I could ask my patients in Chinese, in Hokkien of course," he said when speaking to about 500 Malaysian diasporas during a dinner held at the China World Summing Wing Hotel in Beijing...