KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 14 — Ex-prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said he sued Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi for defamation as the public likely believed his claim in 2017 that the former was of Indian descent.

Testifying as the first witness for his defamation lawsuit against Ahmad Zahid at the High Court here, Dr Mahathir said there was no evidence he was born as "Mahathir s/o Iskandar Kutty”.

"Zahid was deputy prime minister (at the time), what he says is very serious, people take him seriously.

"Other people call me names but it does not matter because they are not the DPM,” Dr Mahathir said.

While acknowledging that Ahmad Zahid’s remarks were from 2017, Dr Mahathir claimed that it had affected the 2018 general election as voters, especially the Malays, believed the DPM’s claims.

"I was less popular because of the statement made by Ahmad Zahid. He implied that I was not a Malay or a Muslim,” he said.

Ahmad Zahid’s lawyer Mohamed Shahrul Fazli Kamarulzaman then asked Dr Mahathir how the latter knew the claim affected Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia’s (Bersatu) performance in GE14, when the party won just 13 out of 52 federal seats it contested.

When the lawyer then suggested that Bersatu’s performance could have been due to being a new party compared to Umno and PAS, the former party chairman did not respond.

Upon further pressing, Dr Mahathir insisted Ahmad Zahid’s remarks "affected some of the voters but not all the people’, which he claimed this was discussed in a Bersatu post-mortem meeting, the specifics of which he did not recall.

When the lawyer asked why it took Dr Mahathir another five years after GE14 to sue, calling it "extreme lateness”, Dr Mahathir said he was busy being the prime minister from May 2018 to February 2020.

However, he did not explain why he did not sue from March 2020, when he resigned as the PM, until July 2022.

Dr Mahathir is claiming Ahmad Zahid had on July 30, 2017 at the Kelana Jaya Umno’s division meeting, made false and defamatory accusations against him, including mentioning "Mahathir anak lelaki Iskandar Kutty”, implying that was his original name.

In his lawsuit filed on July 20, 2022 at the High Court in Kuala Lumpur, Dr Mahathir is seeking compensation from Ahmad Zahid for hurting his reputation and causing society to lose trust and confidence in him and his leadership.

He is also seeking a court order for Ahmad Zahid to publish an unconditional apology — in both written and verbal form — over the defamatory statements.

Dr Mahathir is also seeking an injunction or court order to stop Ahmad Zahid or his agents or assistants or anyone from communicating, giving comments, repeating or causing the publication of the defamatory statements.

The hearing before High Court judicial commissioner Gan Techiong resumes this Wednesday.