"There's no more rule of law," said Mahathir Mohamad, the 90-year-old grandee who was prime minister of Malaysia for 22 years. "The only way for the people to get back to the old system is for them to remove this prime minister."
Mahathir has been openly criticizing the current prime minister, Najib Razak, for the past year although they both belong to the same political party, the United Malays National Organization (UMNO). What made it special this time was that he said it at a two-day mass demonstration in the center of Kuala Lumpur.
Mass demonstrations are normally attacked and dispersed by the police in Malaysia despite its formally democratic system, but this time the police remained peaceful. There were the usual disputes about how many people were there, with the organizers claiming 300,000 and the police saying 20,000, but the important thing was that Mahathir showed up and gave it his support.