The fourth Prime Minister of Malaysia, Tun Dr.

Mahathir Mohamad has become the

most famous leader in South East Asia. Nowadays, our country, Malaysia has been as one of
the greatest countries in this region. Although Malaysia has multiple races and religions, they
live in peace, harmony and tolerate with each other. This country is developing and respected
by other countries because of this renowned leader, one of the greatest leaders that was born
on 30 December 1925 in Alor Setar, the capital city of Kedah. Tun Dr. Mahathir has been
active in politics since 1945 as he joined United Malays National Organization (UMNO)
since its inception in 1946. On 16 July 1981, he became the fourth Prime Minister of
Malaysia replacing Tun Hussien Onn who known as Father of Unity (Perdana Leadership
Foundation, 2011). After all of his hard work, he has contributed a lot to Malaysia from three
different aspects which are economy, development of infrastructures of the country and
paradigm shift among citizens, their way of thinking for the future.
The first contribution of Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad is in the economy aspect. There
are many contributions in the economy aspect that he has contributed such as Sepang
International Circuit that has been introduced on March 1999 (trax ASSOCIATES, n.d). The
circuit has been the host for some of great events in the world such as Formula One, SuperGT
championship and World Motorcycles Grand Prix (Formula One, n.d). It has also contributed
to our economy because it attracts many tourists from around the world to experience the big
sport events which raises our economy state. This is proven when the first profitable Formula
One race in the circuit is on the second race which the sales increase more than RM9 million
over the first race in 1999 (trax ASSOCIATES, n.d). Besides that, another of Tun Dr.
Mahathirs contribution in the economy aspect is from Proton that was set up by him in 1983
with the help of Mitsubishi Motor of Japan. It has 9500 employees to make sure many
vehicles can be produced so that it can be export to other countries such as Thailand. It also
produces roughly 150000 vehicles a year that can raises up our financial resources (Wayne
Arnold, 2005). This also prove that our country capable to be a development country such as
Japan and widen our transportation development. Lastly, his contribution in economy is
Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre that was opened in May 1998. This landmark has become
the main attraction among tourists from all around the world. It comprises with 88 storey
Petronas Tower, 6 level Suria Mall with 150000 square meter shopping centre, 49 storey
Maxis Tower, 32 storey Mandarin Oriental Kuala Lumpur Hotel and 20 hectares KLCC park
(malaysian-explorer, n.d). This was proved when it contributed approximately RM 2.4
billion in our financial resources (Bernama, 2010).
Another contribution of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad is in the development of
infrastructures for Malaysians. One of it is Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) that was
launched on 1996 extending from the Petronas Twin Tower to the new Kuala Lumpur
International Airport in Sepang and also covered Cyberjaya (Tun Dr Mahathir,2011). It was
designed to enable Malaysias foray into Information Technology (IT). Here, a range of
industry using based technology and its application would be located. Besides that, he has
introduced Putrajaya, as the nations administrative city (Tun Dr Mahathir,2011). It is the
local governing authority and it is independent from the state government. In other word, it
contributed much towards the growth and development of Selangor as it planned to be home
to some 300000 people, as a garden city with 7 parks, including a botanical garden (Tun Dr
Mahathir,2011). Other than that, Kuala Lumpur Tower, the fourth tallest telecommunication
tower in the world has been officially launched by him (Menara Kuala Lumpur,n.d). It is built
to enhance the quality of telecommunication services and the clarity in broadcasting as it can
disseminate public information through television and FM-radio broadcasting. Furthermore,
it stands to be the symbol of Kuala Lumpur, the Garden City of Wondrous Lights. It is also
built to provide efficient tracking services for the Marines, Meteorological and Traffic
Control departments (Menara Kuala Lumpur,n.d). Lastly, it acts as one of the Malaysias
Islamic falak observatory (KL Tower,n.d). For example, it can observe the crescent moon to
determine the start of Ramadhan or the Muslim fasting month. All of this infrastructures has
benefits a lot to all Malaysian in their daily life works.
His last contribution for Malaysia is contributing in the change of citizens way of
thinking. Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has contributed a lot his beloved citizens when he
launched Vision 2020 in 1991, the 30 years plan of what we need to do in order to become a
develop country (Tun Dr Mahathir, 2011). One of the main objectives of Vision 2020 is to
become the nation that is both politically sophisticated and socially and culturally advanced
but without losing our spiritual and moral values. The other objective is to give awareness to
people to always remain modest about their own social and economic status. The last
objective is this vision is the long term goal that the people have worked together to make
Malaysia developed country where the peoples goo of d values with its own unique methods.
As example, an increase in wages can help to make Malaysia a high-income country. The
second contribution into changing citizens mentality is he advocated the Look East policy
for Malaysia (Tun Dr Mahathir, 2011). This policy was introduced to build up work ethics
and management to achieve economic success. We should learn from Japan about the need to
pursue ones own path into economic prosperity and cultural modernity. For instance, Japan
single minded dedication, an impeccable work ethics, discipline high morale and
management capability inspired Malaysias Look East policy. Attracting Japanese
companies to invest and to set up their businesses and bases in Malaysia also one of the ways
to make Look East policy become reality. Lastly Tun Dr Mahathir has written many
articles about the plight of the Malays. Since 1947, he has been writing in the Straits Times
about the plight of Malay by earning a little pocket money for himself. When Tun Dr
Mahathir Mohamad becomes a member of parliament in 1964, he again wrote the Malays
(Tun Dr Mahathir, 2011). The theme of the Malay Dilemma revolved around the position of
the Malays. For instance, he blamed hereditary factors, poor educational facilities,
inbreeding, colonial government policies and practices for the poor performances of the
Malays. So, all of his contributions has changed citizens way of thinking which has inspired
Malaysian to face the challenging world.
In conclusion, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has contributed for this country in three
different aspects which are economy, development of infrastructure and the paradigm shift
among citizens. He has inspired many ideas to promote Malaysia to the top of the world.
Some of the ideas have shown the success such as the introduction of MSC, construction of
Sepang International Circuit and launched of Vision 2020. Our present Prime Minister should
follow his steps to lead our country so that Malaysia will be standing high as other developed
country such as Japan, Germany and United States of America.