Digest on Malaysian News

The topic for this post shall cover special affair on immigration especially on Sabah. Sabah like Sarawak when they help to form Malaysia, have special priviledges among it, is autonomy over immigration. It is written in Constitution of Sabah and Constitution of Sarawak.

Side notes: Sabah and Sarawak never joined Malaysia. These two states together with federation of Malaya states formed Malaysia. Sabah and Sarawak was still under the British administration in 1957.

However, unlike Sarawak, Sabah have been relaxing on enforcing their immigration rules that resulted in the uncontrolled entry of illegals from the Philippines and Indonesia. In Sabah, those illegals immigrants are generally called "pilak" and those pilak has been sore issue all this while.

The invasion of pilak has became worst with the entry of UMNO into Sabah when their nominated ministers and officials closed their two eyes on issues pretaining to illegal immigrants. Their motives of doing so is of course to get votes to ensure that they win the majority to rule Sabah. Votes majority from the illegals. It's an open secret that those illegals was given Malaysia IC (now MyKad) to the illegals so that they would vote for UMNO.

During those time, the corrupted (and scared) Polis or Immigration officers dare not raid the illegal settlements if those illegals planted a pole with UMNO flag. How pathetic. UMNO flag made them immune to Malaysian law. Sabahan law enforcers forgot that UMNO is not the law and they in fact have taken oaf to serve and protect Malaysian citizen inclusive of Sabahan. As such, Sabahan should be protected against the menace of the pilak.

If the federal government does not intervene and assist Sabah to solve their illegal immigrants problem, it would just prove that the federal government (or UMNO) indeed still rely of votes from those imported immigrants who were given Malaysia MyKad indiscriminately by the corrupted immigrations officials as well as officials from the National Registrar.


Extracted from: dailyexpress.com.my/news.cfm?NewsID=56673 (Apr 01, 2008)

Call to revive Ministry

Kota Kinabalu: The Prime Minister has been urged to consider reviving the Ministry of Special Affairs for Sabah and Sarawak.

Sepanggar MP Datuk Eric Majimbun said the Federal government should revive this portfolio which was specially created when Sabah and Sarawak joined the formation of Malaysia.

The Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) Deputy President told reporters this after visiting Inanam township Monday to thank the constituents for their support in the recent general elections.

"In the past we had a Special Affairs Ministry to look after the interests of Sabah and Sarawak at federal level. But now it is put under the Rural and Regional Development Ministry," said Eric.

"Although the role of the Rural and Regional Development Ministry is to provide development for the whole country I see no concentration is given to Sabah and Sarawak," he said.

"Why don't we revive this Ministry (special affairs) because these two states are too big. Sarawak alone is bigger than the peninsula. I think they (Federal) need to view this seriously," he said.

The MP also raised concerns over immigration control in the State which he claimed are too relaxed nowadays.

"I think the State Government should tighten its control over immigration because under the Constitution Sabah has autonomy over immigration which was agreed upon we joined the Federation," he said.

He also urged the State Government to seriously look into the perennial cases of illegal immigrants obtaining the MyKad easily in Sabah which if left unchecked could pose a serious threat to security.

"I know there are lots of suspected illegal immigrants operating their businesses in the Inanam bazaar ground but we cannot do anything because they have the permits and possess genuine MyKads," he said.

"As a local I think most of us know how to distinguish between a local and a foreigner based on their culture, lifestyle and accent. I think it is high time the State Government does something to really scrutinise the suspected foreigners who have obtained genuine MyKads," Eric said.

He also urged the Federal Government to look into the predicament of Chinese vernacular and mission schools in the State saying most are suffering from lack of financial support.

"Since the Prime Minister is coming (to Sabah) I strongly feel that this is the time we have to highlight all these pertinent issues to him," he said.