BBC Hard Talk with Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad

In case anybody missed out Tun Dr. Mahathir's interview with BBC Hard Talk on tv, click here to watch it online (23.10mins).
(RealPlayer is needed to view the video)

I like some of the points brought up by Tun Dr. Mahathir and here are some excerpts of the interview with BBC Hard Talk anchorman, Stephen Sackur.

Tun Dr. Mahathir on democracy;

If you look at the history of the west, they come up with all kinds of ideology, they used it for some time and then found it defective and they dropped it and start on another. One day they will going to forget about democracy because in some countries democracy actually ended up in anarcy and there were practically no government.

It's (democracy) not a system that can fit everybody. You must have a certain understanding of the limitations of democracy in order to make it work.

The great civilisaton of the past do not have democracy and yet they became great.

It's not necessary that the system will work for everybody. But if you have a bad leader , even the democracy system would fail. You must remember that in this democracy country which dropped atom bomb.. killing two hundred thousand people.

Tun Dr. Mahathir on Malaysia

The fact is that we have a multiracial country and if we are not careful, there will be racial flare up and if you look at most of the countries with a multiracial population, they are never peaceful. Even Northern Ireland, it took you such a long time to solve the war in Northen Ireland.

Tun Dr. Mahathir on his "..Jews rule the world by proxy" remark at the Tenth OIC Conference in Putrajaya, 2003.

I'm stating fact..again and again, this is what has happened... Well, this idea of anti semitism is created by the Jewish themselves. we cannot say anything. In fact journalists have been arrested for saying something against the holocaust and.. where is the freedom of press?
No, I am not anti semitic. The fact is that the United States obeys what Israel wants it to do.. I don't want Islamic terrorism anymore than I don't want Jewish attack in Israel or American bomb in Baghdad.

Also check out some other quotes by Tun Dr. Mahathir that I keep in this blog.
Tun Dr. Mahathir on Leadership
Tun Dr. Mahathir on Srebrenica
Tun Dr. Mahathir on 'trusting your memory'
Tun Dr. Mahathir on the US 2004 Presidential Election