“For DAP’s sake, I announce my resignation from the party effective today,” Hew wrote in a Facebook post on Thursday night.

“And I think this is a big relief to me.”

Hew said that his decision was necessitated by how his enemies had been “emphasising and distorting” his words and thoughts.

“They were confusing people by equating my personal speech to DAP’s stand. This had brought trouble to my party, my fellow DAP colleagues and my supporters,” he wrote.

His enemies, Hew said, kept urging the DAP disciplinary unit to take action and sack him.

“They put pressure on different parts of DAP to ban me from giving speeches. They wanted to isolate me.

“This move had brought trouble to Lim Kit Siang and all the leaders in DAP who don’t understand the style of my public speaking.

“I’m aware of all these.”

Hew also said that he had never placed his personal career in DAP as a priority, and had never been interested to run for any post as MP or assemblyman.

“From GE13 until the by-election in Teluk Intan, I had refused to become a candidate in any elections.

“I had chosen instead to speak at ceramahs to contribute to the party and its goal of Ubah (change in government).

“I found that instead of actually running for posts, this was the right way for me to contribute to the process of democracy in Malaysia.

“To solve these problems for good, quitting the party seems to be the best thing to do.”

Hew was embroiled in a social media controversy yesterday after he posted on Facebook that the South China Sea belonged to China.

He added that just because one was anti-Communist, one should not be anti-China.

This resulted in a flurry of reactions from netizens, with some hitting out at him for not respecting Malaysia’s sovereignty.