Keep cronies, family at bay

Tun Dr mahathir Mohamad, while addressing a Malaysian youth seminar at the Universty of Melbourne yesterday, expressed hope that Datuk Seri Najib razak would not be influnced by cronies and family members when he becomes prime minister.
There are several former members of parliment and experts whose advice he should seek to run the country. There is a lot of work to be done to restore the confidence of the people in the government. But Najib must not try to do everything himself. He must get proper advice from the right people. He should not be surrounded by cronies and family members as this will not be good for the country.
He said Najib, his deputy, UMNO and Barisan nasional component parties must work hard as a team to win back public support for the government, which sufered a setback at the last election. "The votes we lost were protest votes. Malaysians were not happy and this was reflected at the ballot box, " he said.
Dr. Mahathir said sections of the public felt that the government had become too arrogabt and out of touch with their needs.
"Some MPs felt that once elected and given a ministerial post, there was no need for them to go back to their electorate to talk to the people, to discuss the issues and find out what needs to be done, and to explain government policies.".
Dr. Mahathir said he hoped that the situation would change under the leadership of Najib.