Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Parliament and Law) Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar clarified that he meant there is no chance that Sabah could ever be handed over to the Philippines when he said the Sulu claim was not related to the question of sovereignty in Parliament on Oct 6.
He also explained that his remarks on the Sulu claim being a personal matter referred to the claim being made by private individuals and not by the Philippines government.
“To clarify, my answer was in relation to whether there is any chance that Sabah could, as a result of the unlawful Paris award, become part of the Philippines.
“Let me say it again that this is not possible. Sabah will never be ceded to or come under the control of the Philippines and the federal government stands by and will always defend the integrity of Malaysia’s territorial sovereignty.
“When I said that the Paris award was a result of a private claim, it was a statement meaning that the claim was made by private individuals - the purported heirs of the defunct Sulu sultan - and not by the government of the Philippines,” Wan Junaidi said in a statement today.
He was clarifying the remarks he made in Parliament on Oct 6 in response to a question from incumbent Kota Kinabalu MP Chan Foong Hin about the ongoing dispute between the heirs to the defunct Sulu sultanate and the Malaysian government.
Back in February, the descendants of the Sulu sultanate obtained a US$14.9 billion award in an arbitration court in Paris, France.
The matter did not garner much attention until the claimants enforced it on July 11 by seizing two Petronas subsidiaries in Luxembourg.
The following day, the Paris Court of Appeal in France allowed the Malaysian government’s application to stay the enforcement of the Final Award on claims by parties claiming to be heirs and successors-in-interest to Sultan Jamalul Kiram II.
Wan Junaidi had described the Sulu claim as an attack on an infringement of Malaysia’s sovereign and economic interests abroad.
He has since said Malaysia will take legal action in the Netherlands to resist and set aside any attempt by the heirs of the late Sulu sultan to enforce the arbitration award against the country. - Mkini
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