He has settled problems within Umno, and he's now worried about who will take over.
This suggests that battle lines are being drawn in advance of UMNO elections later this year.
If past patterns hold, UMNO will hold leadership elections at the end of the year.
The ruling UMNO-led coalition kept its two-thirds majority thanks largely to the ethnic Chinese vote.
The dominant political party UMNO will hold elections in the second week of May.
Now is not the time for UMNO to turn its back on this approach.
"Najib is a shrewd observer of the political flow, " says a former UMNO MP.
Under UMNO tradition, the party president will have to choose from one of three vice presidents.
Should he do that, he will be able to sweep out the UMNO old guard.
UMNO's Su-preme Council urged that Mahathir and Abdullah be nominated for the party leadership unopposed.
"With Anwar, it is always the fight against poverty, " says an UMNO Youth leader, Saifuddin Nasution.
UMNO's "Mr. Clean", Foreign Minister Abdullah Badawi, ousted three years ago, was swept back in.
UMNO's powerful party machinery, but also of Dr Mahathir's ability to win his fights.
UMNO's top decision-making body, the Supreme Council, that it needed to tackle the leadership issue quickly.
Another important issue was the future of the United Malays National Organization (UMNO) in Sabah.
Eventually he was allowed back into UMNO and was recognised as a coming leader.
If he does nothing much wrong and the election result satisfies UMNO, he may even survive.
UMNO's three-yearly leadership competition, which decides the party's presidency, and hence who is prime minister.
The man who poses the biggest threat to UMNO hegemony, however, has problems of his own.
One after another, most of UMNO's leaders have come forward to express support for Mahathir's decision.
UMNO's annual congress in June, the leader of the party's youth wing attacked cronyism and corruption.
Disaffection with Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and UMNO are the main reasons behind last November's voter backlash.
In the coming weeks, UMNO's list of candidates will tell the electorate much about internal party politics.
What shocks me most is that UMNO men have ignored his explicit instructions to support these people.
What is known is that Abdullah faces a tricky task to secure the UMNO No. 2 spot.
UMNO, the largest party in the ruling coalition, which carries with it the job of prime minister.
"This sort of speech is very important at this stage of the UMNO campaign, " says a party source.
Most UMNO division heads and members are businessmen who expect to get government contracts and concessions, he claims.
He led UMNO Youth and other pro-government groups to break up the 1996 APCET forum on East Timor.
Ironically, most Malays are probably more comfortable with UMNO's moderate approach to Islam than with Pas's stricter position.
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