Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has insulted all Malaysians with his explanation on why a non-Malay could become prime minister in the future, said DAP chairman Lim Kit Siang.

Lim was responding to Mahathir's statement to journalists in Cairo yesterday after meeting some 500 Malaysian students, in which the prime minister was reported as "urging the Malays to reassert their supremacy as the only way they can retain the premiership".

According to The Star today, Mahathir said that "the Malays will lose their 'ketuanan' (supremacy) and see a non-Malay becoming a prime minister in Malaysia in the future if they fail to continue efforts to be above the rest".

He said that "if the Malays themselves become so weak, poor, begging around and can be bought with money to support non-Malays (to become a prime minister), then at that time, a non-Malay will eventually hold the post"..

"It is up to the Malays whether they want this or not. But if they can be bought that even their own race can be sold, then we might as well not have a constitution. The Malays then can become slaves in their own country,'' he added.

Lim said that the non-Malays must have felt very disappointed and hurt that the discussion of a hypothetical possibility of a non-Malay becoming a prime minister was framed in the context of the non-Malays "corrupting" the Malays.

"It is also most unworthy on Mahathir's part to imply that if the Malays stop supporting Umno, they will become 'slaves in their own country' with the serious and spurious insinuation that the non-Malays would become the 'slave-masters'," he said.

The former opposition leader called upon Mahathir to retract and apologise for his latest statement, adding that the prime minister had done irreparable harm to Vision 2020 and the concept of Bangsa Malaysia.

Lim added that Mahathir's speech on the possibility of a non-Malay prime minister at the MCA general assembly was designed primarily "to arouse the fears of insecurity of Malays to drive them back into the Umno fold".

Mahathir told the assembly last Saturday that he was confident that one day, when Malaysians of Chinese or Indian descent are accepted by all the races, the prime minister need not come from the Malays alone.

"Mahathir's speech would have been a most irresponsible act if was intended to be part of a 'politics of fear and blackmail' to stampede the Malay voters to restore their support for Umno as interpreted by some Umno leaders," he said.

Early this week, Umno vice-president Muhammad Muhamad Taib was reported as saying that the prime minister's speech served as a "warning" to the Malays to stay united behind the party.