It’s 2.45 am. Endless series of meetings, internal and external, in the past 72 hours, putting me on the road from Petaling Jaya to Perak, Penang and down to Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya, including two ceramahs with Po Kuan in Batu Gajah parliamentary constituency on Friday night and the launching of two election operation centres (Tebing Tinggi and Menglembu in Perak) as well as visit to traditional DAP stronghold in Kuala Lumpur, the Bukit Bintang parliamentary constituency, but which has now become a “danger” seat because of electoral manipulation in the influx of over 6,000 postal voters.

Have been up for 22 hours – including a five-hour marathon meeting of DAP and Parti Keadilan Rakyat leaders which ended with primary agreement for one-to-one contest between DAP or PKR with the Barisan Nasional in Peninsular Malaysia states – with the last meeting just ended an hour ago.

Very tired but no thought of sleep until I blog about Fong Po Kuan. Not just because I have been made the villain causing Po Kuan’s announcement that she would not contest in the 12th general election but also because of her qualities.

At about 2.30 p.m., I received calls asking why I had forced Po Kuan to retire from politics, as AIFM (Chinese) received by motorists had carried news flash that Po Kuan had announced her resignation from the DAP because of her unhappiness with me in forcing her to contest in another constituency.

I never did such a thing and Po Kuan never resigned from the party – but the damage was done, as first impressions (however false) are most lasting, that I had forced Po Kuan to resign from the DAP because I was forcing her to contest in another constituency apart from Batu Gajah. Talking about “eating dead cat”!

The party never asked Po Kuan to change constituencies, as all party leaders had expected and fully supported her to contest for the third time in the Batu Gajah parliamentary seat.

I will not be speaking the truth if I say that Po Kuan’s announcement yesterday had come as a complete surprise to me, although it was a shock to the overwhelming majority of DAP leaders, members and supporters.

I had tried to head off Po Kuan from making such a decision because she is a great asset to the party, Malaysian Parliament and the cause for justice, freedom and democracy but I failed. For this I take full responsibility.

I had skimmed through both the avalanche of comments on her blog and my blog. Po Kuan should know that she is looked up as a beacon of hope for Malaysians in the hard and grueling battle for justice, democracy and a Bangsa Malaysia.

I fully associate with the outpouring of public appeals to Po Kuan to reconsider and rejoin the DAP frontline in the great electoral battle looming before the nation by again standing for the parliamentary seat of Batu Gajah – as DAP, the people and nation need her to create history to deny the Barisan Nasional its unbroken two-thirds parliamentary majority on March 8, 2008 to usher in a new democracy and a new Malaysian politics.

Before I conclude, let me confess that in the past 72 hours, I had departed from my practice since the start of my blog to read every comment published on my blog whether before or after publication – but with the dissolution of Parliament, time simply does not permit it.

As a result, I have not been able to respond to the many legitimate questions raised particularly over donations to the DAP Election Fund. I thank you for your support and let me assure you that every sen of the on-line donation would be fully accounted, audited and made public after the general election.

We need far more financial support from you as what the DAP Election Fund needs to prepare for the “Battle of the Century” in the 12th general election is many many times more than the amounts which have come through online.

Thanks are in order for volunteers led by GKT for taking over management of this blog since the past 72 hours till the end of the election campaign. Let us give GKT and team the time to go through the queries of the past 72 hours and to respond to them.