Umno accepts Mahathir's resignation

Umno's top decision-making body, the supreme council, has today accepted the resignation of former president Dr Mahathir Mohamad from the party.

Party deputy president Najib Abdul Razak told reporters after almost a three-hour meeting that the party had received and accepted Mahathir's resignation.

Najib also said that he hoped Mahathir would rejoin the party sometime in the future.

The meeting, held at the Menara Datuk Onn at the Putra World Trade Centre in Kuala Lumpur, was chaired by Umno president and Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

The 50-member council began meeting at 9pm until about midnight, following which Najib held a short 10-minute press conference.

At the press conference, Najib said that the meeting discussed two matters - Mahathir's resignation as well as on how to strengthen the party.

Najib added that the supreme council members also pledged to continue their support for Abdullah.

"We will also create a plan to strengthen the party to regain the trust of members and the people," he said.

Meeting brought forward

Abdullah, who was also present at the press conference, let Najib addressed the media on behalf of the council members.

This meeting was originally scheduled to be held later this week but was brought forward due to Abdullah's official trip to Japan tomorrow.

Incidentally, Mahathir is also in Japan where both he and Abdullah will be speakers at Tokyo's 14th Nikkei Conference on 'The Future of Asia'. While Mahathir is addressing the two-day conference on Thursday, Abdullah will be speaking on Friday.

Mahathir’s sudden decision to quit has triggered a number of emergency meetings, including one yesterday when Abdullah met with Umno parliamentarians to head off possible similar resignations.

The former premier, who had led Umno for 22 years, quit the party on Monday and said he would not rejoin until Abdullah stepped down, causing a panic in the ranks who feared a mass exodus of party members.

So far there has been little indication of a big number of Umno's three million members following Mahathir’s example.

The only notable resignations were Mahathir’s son Mokhzani and former minister and Kedah mentri besar Sanusi Junid, known to be a loyalist to the former party strongman.

Mass resignations in Umno branches

Joining Mokhzani today is former Kota Setar parliamentarian Dr Abdul Hadi Derani.

According to Star Online, 300 members from an Umno branch from Mokhzani's division in Merbok had resigned en masse.

This was followed by a few hundred members from another branch in Pokok Sena, also in Kedah, and a branch in Petaling Jaya Selatan in Selangor.

In the next few days, it is expected that a few more Umno branches will see mass resignations of members.

However, Mahathir's other son, Mukhriz did not follow suit, arguing that he would remain in the party to fight for reforms.

Nevertheless, Abdullah will need to ensure that the resignations today will not pick up momentum in the coming days and weeks.