PARLIAMENT | Defence Minister Mohamad Sabu admitted today that Malaysia ranked last in Southeast Asia in terms of military strength.

"In terms of the air force, navy, etc, we sit at the last place. Vietnam is far ahead of us and Indonesia is number one," he told the Dewan Rakyat during the minister's Question-and-Answer session.

Mohamad added that Malaysia was a top-ranking country in the 1970s and the current position was embarrassing.

"I will work hard to make Malaysia great again, to become number one again," he said.

He was responding to Danyal Balagopal Abdullah (Harapan-Port Dickson), who asked about the obstructions faced by the military forces, in terms of interference from the ministry and allocations.

Mohamad admitted that the armed forces are short on funding.

"For example, the Royal Malaysian Air Force requested for an allocation of RM1.8 billion but the government had only approved RM1.2 billion, 62 percent of what was requested," he said.

The Kota Raja MP previously revealed that only four out of 18 Sukhoi-Su 30 fighter jets are operational.

He said today that the air force can either choose to send the jets back to Russia for repair or get local experts, if any, to fix the jets.

However, Mohamad added that blaming the previous administration would not solve anything.

"We are now the government so, we will try to address any shortcomings and not repeat mistakes made by the previous government.

"It is important that we move forward," he said.

Meanwhile, in a statement later, Mohamad's press secretary Amin Iskandar clarified that the minister had not meant to say that the Malaysian military was the weakest in the region. 

"In fact, ATM is always ready and is capable of defending the country's sovereignty from any form of intrusion and threat. 

"However, there is a need for the ATM to strengthen its military assets, to be in line with the technological development, and current needs."