Dr Mahathir Mohamad has denied he instructed business tycoon Tajudin Ramli to purchase Malaysia Airlines (MAS) shares in 1994 as a 'national service'.

"I don't remember instructing him to buy MAS shares. At that time, the government was not short of money. Yes, we lost some money but we know what to do, how to recover, and we recovered," he told a press conference after launching a book titled The Chinese Malaysian Contributions in Kuala Lumpur this afternoon.

"Our reserves was more than RM50 billion even at that time, so we don't need the (Tajudin's) money. Perhaps people should ask him (Tajudin) how he came to this conclusion that I forced him, I didn't force him," he stressed.

Tajudin, the former MAS chairperson has in recent court documents dropped a bombshell by claiming his acquisition of a 32 percent stake in MAS in 1994 was done on the instruction of Mahathir and then finance minister Daim Zainuddin.

He purchased the controlling stake of 29 percent in MAS from Bank Negara (which owned MAS shares then) and suffered from the foreign exchange losses, paying RM8 per share above the market price of around RM3, as a 'national service' to help recover losses of the central bank.

"No, no, no, I don't ask people to do national service. That time we don't have national service yet," rebutted Mahathir jokingly, referring to the national service programme introduced in recent years among youths.

Recollecting what happened, the ex-premier said it was Daim who had informed him that Tajudin was interested to buy MAS shares.

"We were privatising everything at that time. They want to buy MAS, they (must) pay money. They don't have money don't give, so they want to give an exchange of shares, (Tajudin's) Celcom shares change for MAS shares, (we say) no money involved, no," Mahathir recalled.

Asked on who has fixed the price of the MAS shares then, Mahathir said it was not him.

Mahathir's version

Meanwhile, Mahathir also commented on his former deputy Anwar Ibrahim's claim that Mahathir, Daim and Second Finance Minister Nor Mohamed Yakcop were responsible for the Bank Negara's forex speculations losses ran into RM30 billions between 1992 and 1994.

He claimed the decision to go into currency trading was made by Bank Negara and its then governor, the late Jaffar Hussein. According to him, Bank Negara set up a 'currency trading room' in London and invited him to see what they were doing.

"I don't make decision. It was a Bank Negara decision and Nor Mohamed was in charge - I am not blaming him but he was in charge - and he did the trading. He was making money, of course nobody complained.

"But suddenly, because of unexpected changes, the Maastricht Treaty (European Union treaty), which Britain decided not to participate, then their (Bank Negara) forecast went wrong and they lost money," he said, arguing that in any trading, there will be profit and losses.

Nor Mohamed was then an assistant Bank Negara governor.

When asked whether he knew that the Bank Negara's losses run into as high as RM30 billion, he responded as saying: "Well, if you ask (opposition leader Lim) Kit Siang, it is always many hundreds of billions, but it actually doesn't come to that."

He also criticised Anwar who claimed that he (Anwar) has no knowledge in the forex losses.

"How can? He was the minister, minister of finance," said Mahathir.

Anwar has described the Forex episode as his worst experience in the interview with malaysiakini.