KUALA LUMPUR: Former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has been given the privilege to get up close and personal with the Polestar 2, a modern electric car model that is being jointly developed by China automotive giant Geely and its Swedish subsidiary Volvo.
In a post on his Facebook page earlier today, the former Premier who is also the former Chairman of Proton Holdings Berhad (Proton) was accompanied by current Chairman Datuk Seri Syed Faisal Albar in taking a very much closer look at the white electric car which had the registration number WHX 2020.
"Earlier this morning DRB-Hicom introduced the electric car 'Polestar 2' to me. It is a car that is being jointly developed by Geely, Proton's joint venture partner.
"I am made to understand that on one charge it can have a range of up to 400 kilometers (km). Just one charge is enough for the car to be used like normal. For recharging it takes less than two hours to get 100 per cent.
"If charging using electricty from home, it will take around seven hours to fully charge. But now it is not dofficult because there are now more than 1000 stations all across the country, so there should not be any issue or problem to charge such electric vehicles just about anywhere," said Tun Dr Mahathir.
According to Tun Dr Mahathir, in terms of design, the car is very modern and advanced, whereas on the inside, the cabin, it is neat and futuristic, where all the controls and commands can be made or done by just a touch or swipe on the'tablet'.
"There are no more switches and knobs on the dashboard like what is found on conventional, normal cars. I hope that Proton will be able to develop such a project so that one fine day Proton will be able to produce its very own electric car," he said.
Tun Dr Mahathir added that for most countries, there is an incentive by the government for those who purchase electric cars, so perhaps such a vehicle could be the choice of the people.
"I feel that in the future such a car, such a vehicle could be the choice of transportation because of reduced pollution. Though we must bear in mind that even though such cars do not pollute the air, electricity from power stations does.
"Electric cars have not reached such a level where it is free of air pollution. So in the end we might end up using a hydrogen car instead perhaps, even then there are other issues and problems that must be tried, tested and resolved," he said.
Before this there was speculation circulating and making its rounds on the Internet that the Polestar 2 model could be the all-new Proton Perdana.