Sabah's lost golden opportunity

Sabah lost a golden opportunity to get Kuala Lumpur to listen to the people’s plea for the illegal immigrant issue to be resolved through the Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI).

Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) Information Chief, Chong Pit Fah said the opportunity was lost when the State Assembly Speaker rejected the motion moved by Luyang Assemblywoman Melanie Chia to discuss the RCI’s establishment during the recently conclude State Budget sitting.

Chong said the rejection of the motion to discuss the establishment of the RCI in order to investigate and recommend solution to the extraordinary population boom in Sabah also showed that the BN leaders in Sabah were merely giving lip service to the people.

“The BN component parties in Sabah have been harping on the RCI issue relentlessly with almost all of them claiming to support for its setting up so that the issue of illegal immigrants getting citizenship illegally can be resolved.

“But when the matter was brought up to the State Legislative Assembly by a SAPP elected representative none of these leaders who were present at that time stood up to support the motion.

“If they were really sincere they could at least try to change Speaker Datuk Salleh Tun Said’s mind from rejecting the motion outright,” said Chong.

According to Salleh, while the motion was specific and involved the interest of the people but that is not necessary for the sitting to be adjourned just to discuss the issue.

Furthermore, he said the matter of RCI was under Kuala Lumpur jurisdiction.

“Everyone knows that the RCI is under the jurisdiction of the Federal Government but since the Sabah BN component parties had been complaining about the Federal dilly dallying on the matter then the best avenue for Sabah to make itself heard is through the State Assembly,” he said.

A unanimous decision for the motion by the Sabah Legislative Assembly members would surely open the eyes of the Federal leaders as it reflected the seriousness of the Sabah leaders, irrespective of their political affiliation, he said.

“Sadly, the motion was rejected just like that ... this shows that the Sabah BN leaders are not sincere,” he said.

Chong said the people now doubted if the illegal immigrants and new citizen issue in Sabah can ever be resolved by the BN government.

- SAPP Press