After being sidelined after the last 2008 general election the late Lim Chong Eu emerged in less appealing state as an elder statesman or former chief minister of the state.

It was a negative climax for his party and personal career in politics. No one knows how he must have felt to see the state falling to the opposition.

He probably didn’t care since it was still in the firm control of the Chinese. He, and the other MCA and Gerakan leaders would probably not like it if the state had been reverted to Umno rule because they thought the state is still a Chinese-majority one.

That was the past. Today Penang is a Melayu-majority state. .

Did Chong Eu die a bitter man? Or was he happy to have seen how Penang which had been under Barisan rule for so long since Merdeka finally fell to the opposition Pakatan or more specifically DAP rule?

So there is nothing much that he and his supporters could be proud of because it was during his time that they lost the state to the opposition for the first time, although it may be just a temporary setback.

And I don’t think there is any Melayu in Penang and the whole of Malaysia who will be happy with his personal achievements because it was at the expense of the well-being of the Melayu in the state.

For the whole time he was chief minister of Penang, what did he do for the well-being of the Melayu? The state of the economy of the Melayu and the ownership of land of the Melayu were reduced until they reached the critical state of the present time.

Is this an achievement of his that the Melayu want to appreciate seeing how much land which used to be owned by the Melayu falling into the hands of the Chinese?

I feel sorry for the Melayu in Penang for having trusted the MCA and then Gerakan with their future because they were said to be coalition parties in Barisan, but whose existence in the state only caused the Melayu to be so displaced.

There is no state in the whole Federation where the Melayu are in such a backward state, other than in Kelantan, which ironically has been under PAS rule for so long.

So now tribute and homage are being churned to highlight the deeds of this one man which some has described as the father of industrialisation of Penang.