PUTRAJAYA, MALAYSIA: Former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has promised to name Umno members implicated in money politics on his influential blog www.chedet.com.

He said he was willing to be sued for defamation and even risk arrest by the authorities because he was not afraid to expose the truth and the identities of such errant members.

"I can't do anything about the complaints except to hand these over to the Umno disciplinary committee. I will put these names up in my blog.

"I am not afraid of being sued for libel or being arrested by the police. If they can release (blogger and Malaysia Today editor) Raja Petra Kamarudin, won't they also be able to release me as well?" he said in his dialogue with a group of Umno members and leaders, ex-ministers and Malay student groups at the Perdana Leadership Foundation here yesterday.

Earlier, an Umno member from the Parit division had complained of money politics in his area and had asked for Dr Mahathir to look into the list of names of those implicated in the division.

Since its launch a year ago, Dr Mahathir's blog has achieved nine million hits.

Earlier, in his speech, Dr Mahathir said voters would continue to reject Umno or Barisan Nasional if its new leader continues with the present policies and does not come down hard on corruption and money politics.

"Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak has mentioned that he will continue with the teachings of Islam Hadhari. This is not a good sign as it shows that the transition is only in the person, and not in terms of policies.

"The voters did not like the policies that were put into place by the current Prime Minister, so they will still reject Umno. So, there is no point in having such a transition," he said.