Former premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad today denied he has endorsed S Subramaniam for the MIC number two position.

However, he remained firm in his views that MIC's woes are related to its veteran president S Samy Vellu.

mahathir and rais yatim pc 190309 01 Mahathir was commenting on the Subramaniam-linked Tamil daily Makkal Osai 's front-page report yesterday which quoted him as praising the MIC deputy presidential hopeful and attacking Samy Vellu.

"No, they came to me, to ask my opinion, I never even thought about the MIC elections, I just gave my opinion," he told reporters in Petaling Jaya.

"He (Subramaniam) does not have my support, I did speak to Makkal Ossai , they asked me, I simply answered. But I never referred it to the MIC elections," he explained.

NONE Subramaniam, who was the former MIC deputy president, will be attempting to reclaim the post in tomorrow's party elections. He will be facing incumbent G Palanivel and vice-president S Sothinathan.

On Samy Vellu, Mahathir confirmed that he told the daily that MIC's problems are caused by the president.

"I hear a lot of Indians say that they no longer support MIC because of Samy Vellu," he said.

'Bored of Samy Vellu'

According to Mahathir, the Indian-based party will never be able to recover from its electoral trashing last year if Samy Vellu remains at the helm.

"Right now the Indians are split into eight political parties. If they used to support MIC, now a lot of them don't, and they give the same reason. They are bored with Samy Vellu," he said.

The former premier said that he already predicted before the 2008 elections that MIC will lose as long as Samy Vellu remained and recent events have proven him right.

NONE Questioned on Samy Vellu's comment to Malaysiakini today that Mahathir was the expert in the art of ' destroying deputies ', he replied: "He is the one who wants to control MIC until no one can take over from him. Anybody who is his deputy, after awhile, if that person is popular, Samy Vellu will cut him off."

Mahathir also told the media of how Samy Vellu went as far as to accuse him of not doing enough for the Indian community but later denied it when the news broke out.

The former premier, who was in Syria then, said Samy Vellu had called him to deny the matter but a reporter later showed him the tape of the MIC president saying it.

"This is obviously wrong, I helped all races, not only the Malays," he added.

When asked about the current tussle in Barisan Nasional's component parties like MCA and MIC, Mahathir warned: "BN must be careful, if not it may lose the in the next general election."