The worst divide among the Malay community occurred during Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s tenure as prime minister, a senior PAS leader said today.

PAS vice-president Idris Ahmad claimed in a statement that Mahathir, now the Pakatan Harapan chairperson, is pretending to forget about his own role in dividing the Malays.

“Not only were the Malays divided, even the original Umno was broken apart.

“Three deputy prime ministers and a deputy president had lost their positions,” he said in response to Mahathir’s latest accusations against PAS.

Mahathir had in a blog post yesterday reiterated his claim that PAS has created a divide among the Malays, even causing family members to fight with each other.

Among others, Mahathir insisted that teachings propagated by PAS have led to situations where there could be two imams for one prayer, Muslim bodies buried at separate sites, and Muslims accusing each other of being infidels.

“I came from the era before PAS was formed. There were the younger and older generations. But there was no divide among the Malays due to religion.

“For sure, there was no one prayer with two imams, separate burial sites, and other things,” he said in the posting directed at PAS deputy president Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man.

Commenting further, Idris pointed out that prior to Umno’s formation in 1946, there was already a Parti Kebangsaan Melayu Malaya formed on Oct 17, 1945, in Ipoh.

“So which is the party that divided the Malays? PAS or Umno?” he questioned.

The Bukit Gantang MP also said there was nothing surprising about Mahathir making accusations against PAS.

“Tun (Mahathir) had once said PAS was set up by the colonials. He tried to erase the history of how Umno was actually the one in the colonials' embrace.

“At the time in 1948 when all left-leaning parties were banned by the British, Umno continued to thrive,” Idris said, adding that none had dared to correct Mahathir’s statement, as he had full control over the government at the time.

In reiterating PAS’ oft-repeated stand that Mahathir should live to see the impact of his own doings, he noted that times have now changed, with the Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Bersatu) chairperson no longer having his previous powers.

Idris, however, did not directly respond to Mahathir’s question on whether individuals who do not join PAS will be labelled as infidels.