Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s latest remarks about Malaysia’s football naturalisation scandal were clearly meant to sound like a statesman’s moral warning, a lecture on honesty, integrity, and national shame. But for many Malaysians, it came across as tone-deaf and hypocritical. When Mahathir condemns “powerful individuals who think they are above the law,” he conveniently forgets that his own political career was built on precisely that principle. It was during Mahathir’s long rule that Malaysia’s judiciary endured one of its darkest episodes. The 1988 judicial crisis, which saw Lord President Tun Salleh Abas and several Supreme Court judges dismissed, marked a turning point in our history. It was Mahathir’s government that eroded judicial independence, punishing judges who dared to rule against the executive. The courts were turned into tools of political convenience, and the damage took decades to repair. For someone who once insisted that “judges must follow government policy,” Mah...