Dr Ananthan Krishnan assumes that charisma is the sole ingredient a leader needs to lead a party ( [#1]Let go, Kit Siang[/#] , Feb 27). By this criterion, Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, Dr Syed Husin Ali and all the rest of the hotch-potch BA leaders should never have been party leaders.

The writer says that "the days of Chinese-based opposition parties are over" but does not explain why. Is he implying that, in the past, all Chinese Malaysians could only choose between MCA and DAP? Or is he insinuating that DAP has no place for other races? Has he forgotten how not too long ago members of his own community had walked away en masse from the so-called 'multiethnic' Keadilan, the party that had allegedly shed their racist ideas?

He further says that Lim Kit Siang had "failed to realise that DAP had no answer to the Umno scare tactics and threat of May 13 unrests", thus ignoring the fact that such tactics had been tried for decades and that they did not prevent DAP from garnering mass support.

The freedom to join any party is not in question: fidelity to BA agreement is, and Dr Chandra Muzaffar of Keadilan himself has admitted the righteousness of DAP's complaint.

The writer might say that "the younger generation wants a multiethnic Malay-based party to rule Malaysia", but they are not the people I happen to know.

The writer should learn to speak only for himself, and not attempt to speak for others without factual backups.