KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 27 — Following the public rejection of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Umno has now called on other parties to join the Muafakat Nasional pact ahead of the 15th general election.

On his Twitter account, Umno secretary-general Tan Sri Annuar Musa also pledged to grant East Malaysia full autonomy based on the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63).

"Muafakat Nasional is ready to engage with all parties especially those representing the various races in Peninsular Malaysia so that we can work together towards GE15,” Annuar said in a series of tweets this morning.

"For Sabah and Sarawak, we are taking a different approach by giving them full autonomy in line with the spirit of MA63.”

BN, along with Islamist party PAS, once bitter rivals, have bandied together to form Muafakat Nasional in order to take back Putrajaya.

Following the 14th general election, several component parties of BN in Sabah and Sarawak had left the coalition, leaving BN with just Peninsular Malaysia-based Umno, MCA and MIC.

The East Malaysian parties have since formed state-based coalitions Gabungan Bersatu Sabah and Gabungan Parti Sarawak.

There were speculations that supporters of Dr Mahathir would work with BN and PAS to form a "backdoor government”, but the interim prime minister has harshly dismissed any possibility of him working with Umno and PAS, which was what drove him to resign as prime minister and his party’s chairman.

BN and PAS have since called for a snap election and refused to support Dr Mahathir as prime minister.

Today, Annuar took aim at Dr Mahathir, claiming he had failed to get his Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition to work together.

"The main cause of the problems now is becoming clearer. From being angry with an individual to being angry at your party... why?

"It’s because the party has rescinded its support. Then he gets upset at not only the Opposition but his own party and proceeds to hand in his resignation,” Annuar posted.