Raja looked over the Separation Agreement that Lee Kuan Yew had handed him, and said: “I will not sign it.” He could not bow to the decision to split Singapore from Malaysia. And he would not. It was 7 August 1965, and he was enduring the most painful hours of his political life.

Lee had broken the grim news to Raja as soon as he strode into Temasek House in KL. It was just past 8 a.m. Raja had rushed up after being summoned by a phone call from Lee in KL at about 1 a.m. Come to Temasek House for an urgent meeting, the PM instructed. Take the first morning flight to KL, and tell no one, he added.

Upon arriving at the two-storey bungalow, Raja found Lee in a “very agitated frame of mind”. Without any pleasantries to ease the blow, the PM took him aside and told him: “Raja, we have come to a fork on the road.” He then laid out the Tunku's proposals. They sounded to Raja like an ultimatum mixed with a threat: either leave Malaysia willingly, or be responsible for a racial bloodbath.

The full horror of the situation hit him when Lee said he did not want to be responsible for a bloodbath and had to accept separation from Malaysia. Raja's answer was a sustained attempt to challenge and overturn that decision. In an anguished voice, he asked: How could they betray the leaders from Sabah and Sarawak? He went over how the Borneo territories, fearful of Malay domination, would not have joined Malaysia in 1963 had it not been for Singapore's assurance of its countervailing presence. And how could they abandon their MSC allies and supporters after marching them up the hill? They had stuck out their necks to fight alongside the PAP for a Malaysian Malaysia.

Lee felt his angst. It was “painful” to let down all the people that they had mobilised in Malaysia, he said. “But I think I have to do this,” he added, referring to the Separation Agreement.