Dr Mahathir Mohamad expressed his gratitude to Malaysians for showing former premier Najib Abdul Razak the exit in the last general election.

Otherwise, the prime minister claimed the nation would have incurred RM300 billion more debt.

“You've done a great job of getting rid of Najib, and had he won we would incur another RM300 billion of debt,” he told Malay Mail.

Mahathir claimed Najib promised between RM60 and 80 billion in allocations for each state if BN had retained power in the May 9 national polls.

“Where is he going to get the money? Any thinking man would know he has to borrow, and if he's borrowing, he's going to add to the debt,” he added.

According to the report, it is unclear how Mahathir arrived at the figure. It also added that the promises mentioned by the prime minister were not in BN's election manifesto either.

Previously, Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said that the federal government's debt and liabilities amounted to RM1.087 trillion, or 80.3 percent of GDP.

Broken down, this included the federal government debt of RM686.8 billion, government guarantees (RM199.1 billion), and lease payments for public-private projects (RM201.4 billion).

Following this, the government launched Tabung Harapan Malaysia.

Meanwhile, Mahathir told Malay Mail that the debts are already over 80 percent of the country's GDP.

“People don’t calculate, you see? He said we're within our borrowing limit, but it's not. It goes beyond that limit,” he said.