As Malaysians wake up to a new dawn in their political history, the former ironman of Malaysia, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad has lashed out at his hand-pick successor saying he has destroyed the ruling coalition.

Malaysia’s ruling coalition retained control of the government in last weekend’s general elections, but suffered major blows as the opposition managed to wrest control of three states.

The National Front coalition, led by Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, managed to secure a simple majority of 112 parliamentary seats out of the 222 seats contested in the polls. But it was the first time since 1969 that the opposition managed to deny the ruling coalition a two-thirds majority.

The coalition suffered one of its biggest defeats after the opposition managed to win control of the northern Penang state. For the first time, the coalition also lost control of the central Selangor state and northern state of Kedah, bringing to four the number of the nation’s 13 states under opposition control.

Mahathir, who led the ruling Umno which helms the Barisan Nasional coalition for 22 years before stepping down in 2003, lashed out after its worst performance in history.

“My view is he has destroyed Umno, destroyed the BN and he has been responsible for this,” Mahathir told reporters.

He suggested Abdullah should resign, and said he had made a mistake in selecting him as prime minister.

“I think he should accept responsibility for this. He should accept 100 per cent responsibility,” he said. “I am sorry but I apparently made the wrong choice.”

Mahathir has previously said he never intended for Abdullah to serve more than one term, and that he should have opted instead for influential Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak who is now leader-in-waiting.

BN suffered its worst ever result in Saturday’s polls, losing its two-thirds majority in parliament for the first time since 1969 and conceding four more states to a resurgent opposition.

Abdullah was punished over rising crime and inflation in an election also tinged by rising racial tensions between majority Muslim Malays and minority ethnic Chinese and Indians.

“I think the people must have been very angry, all the races, Chinese, Malays and Indians,” Mahathir said. “The problem is we (the government) have become so arrogant. We suppress any opinion that we do not like and they begin to believe in their own reports which are not actually consistent with what is happening in the country.”

Abdullah was Mahathir’s hand-picked successor when he stepped down, but after the new leader dumped several of his pet projects he began launching accusations of economic mismanagement, nepotism and corruption.

The coalition also suffered embarrassing losses in many of its state and parliamentary seats, signalling increasing voter disenchantment towards the government.

“Even though the National Front has managed to retain its majority, this is an crushing blow to Abdullah and to party leaders of the coalition,” one political observer said. “This kind of victory for the opposition, which is so much more disadvantaged in an electoral system that favours the government, is really a slap in the face for Abdullah.”

More than 70 per cent of 10.92 million registered voters cast their votes in last Saturday’s polls in a relatively peaceful election.