Laying old Sabah ghosts to rest

The defamation suit brought by former chief minister Harris Salleh against SAPP president Yong Teck Lee will open up a Pandora's Box.

COMMENT

March 19 to 23 next year will stage the stage for a battle royale in the Kota Kinabalu High Court on a RM50 million defamation suit brought by one former chief minister against another. The case has opened up a Pandora’s Box, in more ways than one, since it will no doubt dwell as well on the fact that oil was the reason why Sabah was not allowed to follow suit when Singapore left the Federation of Malaysia in late 1965.

Harris Salleh, an Indian-Brunei Malay, is suing Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) president Yong Teck Lee, a Chinese-Suluk.

The latter, according to Harris, had allegedly publicly insinuated that he (Harris) had something to do with the June 6, 1976 air crash which took the lives of then chief minister Fuad Stephens and 10 others including five ministers.

Harris bases his insinuation theory partly on the fact that he was the one who became chief minister upon Stephens’ tragic demise and went on to sign the controversial oil agreement with Petronas and the federal government. Harris suspects that fingers have been pointed at him ever since then – Yong’s call merely confirms it – and he obviously thinks that it’s time to clear the air and ensure his place in history before he meets his maker.

The suit arose after Yong called for the case file on the tragedy to be re-opened in the wake of public comments following a talk given by former finance minister and Petronas chairman Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah on April 2 last year in Kota Kinabalu. Much of Razaleigh’s talk was devoted to the 1976 tragedy because, according to him, he was still haunted by it and especially whenever he was in Sabah. Many Sabahans are convinced that Razaleigh, or Ku Li, was sending out a subtle message in his own way and he deliberately chose Kota Kinabalu to do it.

Razaleigh had given a gripping account of how he was taken down from the ill-fated aircraft at the very last minute by Harris. The Petronas chief, in turn, invited then Sarawak chief minister Abdul Rahman Ya’kub to accompany him. Razaleigh was then all belted up and chatting away seated next to Stephens on the GAF Nomad aircraft which was ready for take-off at Labuan Airport.

It’s bit of a mystery how Harris could breach protocol and why – he reportedly didn’t ask Stephens – and get Razaleigh off the plane, at the very last minute ostensibly to visit a cattle farm in Kudat. No one can ask Stephens in court for his account. Dead men tell no tales. But Rahman is still around to shed some light on the mystery. No doubt Razaleigh himself will be called to court by Yong as a star witness.

Conspiracy theories

Stephens was headed for Kota Kinabalu where Razaleigh, and Rahman Ya’kub, had been expected to try and persuade the Sabah chief minister one more time to sign away the state’s oil and gas reserves to the national oil corporation and the federal government in perpetuity. Rahman had already signed such an agreement with Petronas and the federal government.

Earlier, Stephens had been expected in Labuan to sign the so-called oil agreement. Stephens, by all accounts, held out for a higher royalty than the measly 5% the federal government offered for oil and gas produced in the state’s inner waters. The state government would get nothing, under the agreement, for any oil and gas produced in the outer waters.

Stephens predecessor and childhood friend, the legendary Suluk chief Mustapha Harun, had been dethroned by Kuala Lumpur’s machinations on the ground in Sabah for also holding out for a higher oil royalty. Mustapha wanted 20% and not just in the inner but outer waters as well. Kuala Lumpur wouldn’t hear of it and backed Stephens’ newly-launched Parti Berjaya to bring about the downfall of Mustapha’s United Sabah National Organisation (Usno) state government.

Again, Yong has explained himself hoarse that he merely asked for the case to be re-opened – enough to nettle the hypersensitivity of Harris on the issue – to bring closure to the tragedy. The SAPP leader had made a valid point for once. The tragedy continues to haunt all Sabahans and conspiracy theories abound.

Harris, however, thinks that Yong was also trying to make political capital out of the issue at his expense and to revive the fortunes of his ailing mosquito party. Harris wants to prove that he would be no scapegoat for any hidden hands that may have been involved in the tragedy. In that sense, Harris, like Yong, may want to bring closure as well to the tragedy so that his good friend Stephens and the others can rest in peace.

Yong was not the only one to openly make the call. Then PKR vice-president and de facto Sabah and Sarawak PKR chief Jeffrey Kitingan made the same call. Harris wanted to sue Jeffrey as well but Yunof Maringking, Harris’ lawyer in the suit against Yong, refused to take the case. Yunof goes a long way back with Jeffrey from their Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) days.

Yunof, a fellow Dusun, thought that it was sacrilegious to sue Jeffrey, the younger of the Kitingan brothers in politics. His elder brother, Joseph Pairin, is PBS president, a former chief minister and currently a deputy chief minister. Kitingan senior is also Huguan Siou, paramount chief, of the Dusuns – including the Kadazan or urban Dusun – and the Muruts. The Kitingans are cast, much like the Kennedys and Gandhis, in the mould of political royalty in Sabah.

Bad British idea

Ironically, Harris’ suit against Yong came up for mention in the High Court on the 35th anniversary of the air crash, dubbed the “Double Six Tragedy”, probably an ominous portent of things to come.

Just 10 minutes away from the High Court, Stephens’ widow Rahimah and state government representatives gathered at the Double Six monument in Sembulan, for 15 minutes, to lay wreaths and mark the ill-fated date and tragedy.

If something good comes out of Harris suing Yong, it may be an even greater determination on the part of the Sabah government to review the oil agreement.

Many feel that Malaysia should follow in the footsteps of Indonesia to devolve and give greater power to the states. That would also include, like in Indonesia, the oil states keeping 70% of their oil and gas revenue while 30% goes to the federal government for its upkeep and to channel to the non-oil states.

All this can only happen if we accept the thinking that the federal government must downsize as it has since pledged, concern itself only with national economic planning, security and foreign affairs and get out of the business of business.

Equally pertinent is the school of thought that Malaysia is a bad British idea which was not allowed to work in Brunei, did not work in Singapore and has never worked in Sabah and Sarawak. Stephens, like Mustapha, was a stumbling block that some quarters in Kuala Lumpur thought needed to be removed one way or another.