There’s a reason to celebrate, to reflect

Over the years a lot of the "the west Malaysian disease" has also come over to Sabah and the religious divide is growing and bigotry is filling the gap, claims activist Anne Lasimbang.

By Melvin Augustine and Jason Majpie

KOTA KINABALU: Despite the sorrows and cynicism of their state’s history in the Federation of Malaysia, Sabahans have reason to celebrate – they have retained their tolerance and friendliness despite 50 years of difficulties.

It’s what Anne Lasimbang, a social activist who has dedicated her life to helping empower indigenous communities in the state, believes.

The executive director for Pacos (Partners of Community Organisations) Trust, an NGO that works with rural communities in Sabah, told FMT that she was in a celebratory mood as Sept 16 marked a fiftieth birthday.

Malaysia’s golden jubilee, she said, is very “special”.

“Fifty years is an important landmark. In the life of a person it would mean that we are sort of matured already so this year is very special for me as a Sabahan,” she said.

She is also celebrating because she is grateful that the people of her state which helped create the nation 50 years ago have come through with their character intact.

“I hope that people are now able to reflect about themselves a Sabahans and Malaysians and plan for the future.”

Lasimbang, whose focus of work now is mainly on development, human rights and promoting environment awareness said she was just four when Sabah joined Sarawak, Singapore and Malaya to form Malaysia on September 16th, 1963.

“I don’t really have a lot of memories … I was still a child running here and there but I have some vague memories about something happening then because my aunty was very active in politics during the formation of Malaysia,” she recalled.

Logging, oil palm, poverty

For her, the most significant events in Sabah over the last 50 years were the twists and turns of politics in the state and how Sabahans could evict any government that they felt was not governing up to their standards.

“In 1975 I was in secondary school already and witnessed the people change the government from Usno to Berjaya. That was quite significant.

“Then 10 years later we voted out Berjaya and brought in PBS. And then things changed,” she said.

She was referring to how the peninsula-based political giant Umno wrested power from PBS despite the later winning the election in 1994, and remaining in control up to this day.

Other events she sees that stained the country were the detentions without trial during the reign of former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, which caused a climate of fear and loathing.

“I was a student activist in the university during the 1980s. A lot of my friends were also detained under ISA during that time ”

Lasimbang also notes that Sabah’s once pristine environment took a beating over the last 50 years.

“In the eighties I used to do field work and I used to travel to Sandakan and there was no oil palms there then. Instead we saw a lot of logging taking place.

“At that time Sabah was considered to be the richest state in Malaysia because of the logs.

“Now the jungle has been replaced with oil palm. Yes, we may be one of the biggest palm oil producers in Malaysia but we are not the richest state but one of the poorest states now.

“I feel in terms of involvement in politics and in terms of the environment the scenario has changed for the worse,” she said.

Intolerance – a West Malaysian disease

Lasimbang, like several other influential people in the state, also worries there may be more damage to the Sabah psyche with the ramping up of racial and religious sentiments by desperate politicians in the peninsula fearful of losing their grip on power.

“The way people see us may change. We were never racist and nor were we very particular about faiths or people’s religious leanings. We were always very tolerant … Christians and Muslims here.

“But over the years a lot of the intolerance, the west Malaysian disease, has also come over to Sabah,” she noted.

The religious divide, she said, is growing and bigotry is filling the gap.

“Another big impact of course we can see here in Sabah is the influx of illegal immigrants.

“We used to be very safe but with so many people coming over Sabah is not as safe as it used to be before joining Malaysia.

“These are some of the significant things that stand out for me,” she said.

She says the lesson Sabahans should learn from what they have seen and experienced these last 50 years is that they should not be afraid of seeking change when they feel things are not going the way they want.

“Politically I think we need to maintain the ability and freedom to change and elect the government which we think that will help us. We haven’t been able to do that for more than 10 years now.

“We should also start paying more attention to our environment. We used to have very clean water but that’s a rare commodity now especially in the kampongs.

“Yes, we do need oil palm and these types of cash crops for the future of Sabah but we need to strike a balance because in the end when the river and the forest are destroyed our quality of life will go down,” she said.

Stateless children

She said she has witnessed this first hand in the rural areas where life has become even more difficult for villagers because their water supply is polluted and the their food supply to vanish all due to the expansion of oil palm plantations.

“We need to balance development and for that we need leaders in Sabah who have vision for the state. They should be here for the state, looking after the state and not just focussing on maintaining power to such an extent that they give citizenship to people just so that they can vote.

“I was a kid when my parents decided to be part of Malaysia in the federation. Sabah is now part of Malaysia so our future is there. We’re in that journey together with Sarawak and west Malaysia.

“If you really think about, if our country is governed well, then I think we have a bright future here in Sabah.”

Among the issues that she believes must be urgently addressed is how to deal with the thousands of illegal immigrants and especially their children who were born here in Sabah.

“It’s a big problem now. There are so many children born here … stateless children and they will stay here. This is the thing that we have to handle.

“People say send them back but there’s no way they can return because they are born here. They are Sabahans, they are Malaysians now … we have to address that issue,” she said.

As a citizen of Malaysia she would like to know that the future generations of Sabahans, her children’s children, would “continue to enjoy this peace, the prosperity and the beautiful environment that we still have otherwise no point being part of Malaysia”.

Lasimbang said she’s aware that there is also discussion about “maybe we have made a mistake in becoming Malaysia but I think there is no turning back now.

“We have to work together to make this country the best country that we can.

“I don’t want to migrate to other countries … I want to stay in Sabah,” she said with a laugh.