By Massita Ahmad
SINGAPORE, April 24 (NNN-BERNAMA) — A close aide of Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said here Wednesday he wishes to see all bilateral issues between Malaysia and Singapore resolved under Dr Mahathir\u2019s second premiership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A. Kadir Jasin, the special advisor on media and communications to the Malaysian prime minister, said \u201clet us iron out \u2026 if possible, let us get rid altogether of those areas that are causing discomfort in the relationship between the two countries and get on with business\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He was responding to a question at a seminar on \u2018Challenges Facing the New Malaysia\u2019 organised by the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. A question was raised as to what was happening as after Dr Mahathir took the helm (as the prime minister) for the second time, a few bilateral issues surfaced, among them those on airspace, maritime border as well as the 1962 water agreement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kadir said there is nothing to be worried about this development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cPerhaps, this is an unnecessary, unwanted, uninstructed reaction to the change of government in Kuala Lumpur, to take it in a broad, simplistic manner,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to him, the government at the highest level, Dr Mahathir in particular, recognised it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHe is a very shrewd economic administrator. He knows. He could be making noise about airspace, coastal waters, and cheap raw Malaysian water to Singapore but that is politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMalaysia is a very vibrant political environment. If you don\u2019t talk, people think you are dead already or you are not interested. Malaysian politicians have to talk every day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kadir noted that the posturing against Singapore \u201cis as old as history probably\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m not so worried about it. But what I\u2019m more interested in is whether Malaysia and Singapore can be a little bit more gentlemanly in our relationship. Be a little bit more open \u2026 less gung-ho \u2026 less territorial \u2026 less nationalistic,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kadir pointed out that Singapore is Malaysia\u2019s second biggest trading partner and \u201cit is the reality\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Touching on the 1962 water agreement, Kadir said: \u201cI suppose we should forget about this quarrel about the last water agreement. Think of a new one.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kadir noted that \u201cit is dangerous for Malaysia and Singapore to look at their relationship based on written words\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think it is better for us to look at what is going to happen in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To another question, also on Malaysia-Singapore relations, Kadir said that now both sides can really talk as equals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Citing the recent meeting between Dr Mahathir and Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at the 9th Malaysia-Singapore Leaders\u2019 Retreat in Putrajaya, Kadir said: \u201cTo me, the one big success is nothing negative coming out of that.\u201d (photoBERNAMA)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
— NNN-BERNAMA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Massita Ahmad SINGAPORE, April 24 (NNN-BERNAMA) — A close aide of Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said here Wednesday he wishes to see all bilateral issues between Malaysia and Singapore resolved under Dr Mahathir\u2019s second premiership. A. Kadir Jasin, the special advisor on media and communications to the Malaysian prime minister, said \u201clet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":21904,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[288],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21903"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}