“I haven’t had the time to catch up on my reading for a while. ‘A street cat named Bob’ – one of my favourite books,” was what Dr Mahathir captioned for the two pictures posted on his Facebook.

‘A street cat named Bob’ by author James Bowen is a moving, uplifting true story of an unlikely friendship between a man on the streets and the ginger cat who adopts him and helps him heal his life.