‘Sabah Govt can issue own ICs’

Assemblyman Jeffrey Kitingan wants the state government to emulate the federal plan on biometric Mykads for civil servants with fake ICs.

KOTA KINABALU: STAR Sabah has called on the state government to introduce its own Sabah identity cards to weed out those fake Mykads.

Party leader Jeffrey Kitingan said the state government should follow the federal government’s example in implementing a uniform high-security identification card for all government staff to check impersonation and forgery.

He said the high-tech ID which could be made in 30 minutes and the recent move by the Home Ministry to issue 2.5 million i-Kad with biometric security features for foreign workers, proves that a high-security Sabah IC is a step to closing Sabah’s immigration loophole.

“Fake ICs and MyKads have even surfaced in the peninsula with the arrests of foreigners holding fake ICs impersonating as Sabahans. There are probably thousands and thousands of these fake Sabahans in the peninsula,” he said adding that there were claims that up to 1.5 million ICs were issued in Sabah to those who were not eligible to have them.

“The Sabah government has the authority to issue the Sabah IC and there are no prohibitions under the Federal Constitution.

“The non-Sabahan Resident ID Card can help weed out fake IC holders and at the same time help prevent manipulation by the federal government from putting these people on the electoral rolls and usurping the political franchise of true Sabahans.

“The recent reports of foreign children out-numbering locals in several schools should make all Sabahans wary of this timebomb.

“At the same time, it will give the holders the right to work and stay in Sabah and help contribute to Sabah’s economy without being victimised by rogue elements in the security and immigration authorities,” he said.

Kitingan said the move should be financially viable given that there are an estimated two million foreigners in Sabah.

“The Sabah IC and non-Sabahan Resident ID is the only way to ensure that the security and sovereignty of Sabah and genuine Sabahans are genuinely protected,” the Bingkor assemblyman stressed.

He said the continued refusal of the federal government to tackle the issue of fraudulently approved citizenship in Sabah points to political objectives such as keeping phantom voters with ICs on the electoral rolls to ensure it remains in power.

“Everyone knows and even Umno Sabah leaders acknowledge in private that the Umno-led federal government had a hand in the issuance of dubious ICs and MyKads in Sabah.

“Clearly, they wish to maintain Sabah as their ‘fixed deposit’ so as to ensure Umno continue to occupy 32 of the 60 state seats and to keep umno’s hold on the Sabah government and to help maintain their status quo as the federal government in Putrajaya,” Jeffrey said.

This also places control of Sabah’s abundance of natural resources in the hands of the federal government, besides marginalising and disenfranchising the original local natives who have been reduced from being the majority to becoming less than 20% of the population.

“It is reverse ethnic cleansing in reality,” Kitingan charged.

The Sabah IC plan was first mooted by Sabah Progressive Party president Yong Teck Lee as a way to resolve the state’s long-standing immigration disaster after it was revealed that thousands upon thousands of so-called “phantom voters” had taken part in state and national elections.