Mahathir marks two decades at the top

Mahathir has led Malaysia to strong growth and stability

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has joined an exclusive club of 20-year rulers.

The milestone puts 75-year-old Mahathir in the same league as Cuba's Fidel Castro and a clutch of African leaders.

But Asia's longest-serving elected leader has discouraged celebrations of his two decades in power, and there was little comment by the pro-government mainstream press on Monday, Reuters reported.

A jovial Mahathir, who was due to attend a banquet for 25,000 people in the southern city of Malacca later, told journalists that creating a fuss over the anniversary could make some Malaysians think he had been leading them for too long.

"If you didn't remind me, I would probably have forgotten. If you talk too much about it people might feel you've been around too long," he commented on the significance of the anniversary.

The only eulogy appeared in the New Straits Times.

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"There are those who (would) like to see him leave the political scene, but there are also an equal if not greater number who want him to continue leading the country," it said.

"I hope Malaysia will remain stable and grow strongly," Mahathir said at seminar on the power industry on Monday, Reuters reported.

Strong growth and stability were hallmarks of his rule until 1998, when the Asian crisis struck and his deputy Anwar Ibrahim was jailed.

The former finance minister, popular among Muslim Malays, is serving a 15-year jail term on sex and graft charges he says were cooked up to thwart his challenge to Mahathir.

On Sunday, riot police with water cannon broke up a demonstration outside a detention camp in central Malaysia by about 500 people protesting against the use of a tough security law to lock up six Anwar supporters without trial.

Police charged 37 people on Monday for protesting outside a detention camp where leading opposition activists are being held. Local journalists told Reuters the protesters were charged with unlawful assembly -- an offence which can carry up to a one year jail sentence.

"I think I may have made some mistakes, but I can't regret the decisions that I have made although they may have been unpopular, because they lost support," Mahathir said.

"But I believe I did those things for the good of the country, and not for my own (good), because I'm going anyway. I can't stay forever."

Mahathir has frequently pointed at the political chaos in neighbors such as Indonesia and the Philippines to justify crackdowns on opponents.

"This is a new culture -- you have to protest against everything. We find universities these days no longer function as universities," Mahathir said of the latest protest.

Mahathir has said the November 1999 election was his last.

The next election is due in 2004 but he has given no hint when he will stand down.

He is struggling to regain the popularity he enjoyed before Anwar was jailed.

Reuters contributed to this report.