Najib Razak

Mohammad Najib bin Abdul Razak (Jawi: محمد نجيب بن عبد الرزاق, Malay: [nadʒep̚ razaʔ] ; born 23 July 1953) is a Malaysian politician who served as the sixth prime minister of Malaysia from 2009 to 2018. He is the son of former prime minister Abdul Razak Hussein. Najib served as the chairman of the Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition from April 2009 to May 2018 and as the president of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) from November 2008 to May 2018.

The coalition experienced an unprecedented defeat in the 2018 general election, attributed to corruption charges involving Najib and his family, which eroded public trust in the ruling party. The introduction of the Goods and Services Tax, widely regarded as unpopular, also significantly contributed to the decline in support. In 2020, he was convicted of corruption in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad scandal, one of the largest money-laundering and embezzlement scandals in history.

Najib was elected to the Parliament of Malaysia in 1976, at the age of 23, replacing his deceased father in the Pahang-based seat of Pekan. In the same year, he was appointed the head of UMNO Youth's Pekan branch and became a member of the youth wing's Executive Council. In the early years of his political career, Najib took on a deputy minister role in 1976, and between 1982 and 1986, he was the Menteri Besar of Pahang. Thereafter, until 2009, he was rotated throughout the Cabinet of Malaysia, taking on various ministerial portfolios in defence, education, culture, youth and sports, and finally finance. Between 1993 and 2009, Najib was a vice-president of UMNO. During his tenure as deputy prime minister, he was accused of being involved in the 2006 Altantuya Shaariibuu murder case, but he denied any involvement in the case.

Najib's tenure as prime minister, between 2009 and 2018, was marked by economic liberalisation measures, such as cuts to government subsidies, which were unpopular among the public. After the 2013 election, his government pursued a number of its critics on sedition charges, saw the imprisonment of opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim following a conviction for sodomy, and the implementation of a Goods and Services Tax (GST). He was prime minister during the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disaster and a dispute with North Korea following the assassination of Kim Jong-nam.