Mahathir Mohamad famous quotes

I not only think but also look and study things carefully. When I travel around, I look at things carefully, make comparisons of what I see. I don't accept things at face value, you cannot trust what you hear or see. Don't jump to conclusions without thinking.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Thinking #Looks #Faces

I'm a fundamentalist in the true sense. That is to say, I follow the fundamentals of religion... But for over 1,400 years people have been interpreting and re-interpreting the religion to suit their own purpose! ... These [extremist and terrorist acts] are not Islamic fundamentals any more than the Christians who burned people at the stake are fundamentalist. They are actually deviating from the teachings of the religion!
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Christian #Teaching #Islamic

I cannot keep quiet even when I am a lone voice.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Voice #Quiet #Lone

We need an opposition to remind us if we are making mistakes. When you are not opposed you think everything you do is right.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Mistake #Thinking #Making Mistakes

Once started, religious strife has a tendency to go on and on - to become permanent feuds. Today we see such intractable inter-religious wars in Northern Ireland, between Jews and Muslims and Christians in Palestine, Hindus and Muslims in South Asia and in many other places. Attempts to bring about peace have failed again and again. Always the extremist elements invoking past injustices, imagined or real, will succeed in torpedoing the peace efforts and bringing about another bout of hostility.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Christian #Religious #War

Some people say that we here have no freedom of religion, ... In reality, the people in that country are the ones who were forced to embrace a religion.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Country #Reality #People

Knowledge has always been important, of course. The ancient Egyptians did not raise the stones for the pyramids relying on the incantations of their gods. The waters in the irrigation canals of the great Indus Civilisation did not flow according to the laws of ignorance. Knowledge has always been power and wealth.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Ignorance #Knowledge #Law

If you can't be famous, at least you can be notorious.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Notorious #Ifs

I'm brash and abrasive but that's because I've noticed when people are nice and polite they never get anywhere.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Nice #People #Polite

Any organisation has a future, provided it is properly led and it sticks to the objective of that organisation.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Sticks #Organisation #Objectives

No one should have extra influence on an organisation. We should always regard ourselves as equals in the organisation, and we should be concerned about each other's problems.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Should Have #Influence #Problem

If you know each other well, you want to do business with people you know well. You don't do business with strangers.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#People #Want #Stranger

The Malays are spiritually inclined, tolerant and easy-going. The non-Malays, and especially the Chinese, are materialistic, aggressive and have an appetite for work. For equality to come about, it is necessary that these strikingly contrasting races adjust to each other.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Race #Chinese #Materialistic

Membership of an organisation is good, as long as you can make yourself heard.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Long #Membership #Heard

Developing countries like Malaysia should have a say in changing the world financial system since we have faced the problems that it has caused.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Country #Should Have #Developing Countries

History should remember Blair and Bush as the killers of children, or as the lying prime minister and president.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Children #Lying #President

When you have elections in which 90% or 95% or 99% of those elected come from one party, then I think there is some fraudulent act.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Party #Thinking #Election

Most developing countries would know Malaysia quite well. Why? It is because we believe in contacts. We offer them some help for training, for example. We call it 'technical cooperation'.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Country #Believe #Training

Currency trading is unnecessary, unproductive and totally immoral. It should be stopped.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Unnecessary #Currency #Should

Malaysians, during the colonial period, were not given the top positions: we were always subordinate. Fortunately for us, the people who took over were mainly civil servants: people who were serving the Government.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Government #People #Given

I know the situation of the Commonwealth generally, and I know that the aim should be to make the Commonwealth much more relevant to the poorer countries.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Country #Should #Relevant

I thought that the United Nations is a creature of the five super-powers who were given veto powers. I don't like veto powers at all.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Given #Veto #United Nations

The Commonwealth is a mixture of developing and developed world, in which the developed countries were very influential and their policies hold sway most of the time.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Country #World #Mixtures

Even in South Africa, the Commonwealth were not doing anything, and their attitude was to tolerate apartheid in South Africa. There was a lot of lip service being paid to the need to stop this practice, but nothing was done.
-- Mahathir Mohamad

#Attitude #Practice #Lips