Legal giant Karpal Singh, who celebrated his 70th birthday yesterday evening at a hotel in Penang, raised eyebrows when he described his decades-long comrade Lim Kit Siang as the ‘de facto chief minister’ of Penang.

Karpal, who was undeterred by chest pains which saw him admitted into a Kuala Lumpur hospital last week, said during his speech that without Kit Siang, who is Ipoh Timor parliamentarian, the life of the latter’s son Guan Eng would be “susah” (difficult).