KUALA LUMPUR: Former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad claimed his suspicion that Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi would use Umno as 'bargaining chip' to drop his corruption cases has turned out to be true.
Dr Mahathir revealed this was the reason why he had advised the Umno president to dissolve the party when Pakatan Harapan (PH) came to power in 2018.
He also believed that the Bagan Datuk Member of Parliament had even asked then prime minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to drop his cases but when the latter refused to do so, Zahid retracted the support for him.
He said Zahid also tried the same thing with another former prime minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob but that too failed due to strong public objection.
Hence, the parliament was dissolved and triggered the 15th General Election (GE15) to be held the soonest, he said.
"My suspicion came true. He used Umno to ensure Datuk Seri Anwar (Ibrahim) becomes the Prime Minister, though he (Zahid) rejected Anwar and DAP during the GE15 campaign.
"It is clear that Zahid's cases have been dropped under the current PM," he said in his social media posting today.
Earlier this month, Zahid, also the Deputy Prime Minister, was freed of all corruption charges for misappropriating funds belonging to Yayasan Akal Budi (YAB).
The High Court granted him a discharge not amounting to an acquittal (DNAA) on 12 criminal breach of trust (CBT) charges, eight counts of bribery and 27 for money laundering, involving scores of millions of ringgit belonging to YAB.
The prosecutors gave 11 reasons for the court giving DNAA to Zahid.