Daily Express
Published on: Sunday, September 19, 2010
Kota Kinabalu: The Federal Government should seriously implement the 20-Point Agreement on Borneonisation by setting a target to fill at least half the 59 Federal departments in Sabah with Sabahans as heads before the next Malaysia Day celebration on September 16, 2011, said DAP Adviser Lim Kit Siang.
“(Prime Minister Datuk Seri) Najib should table this target at the Cabinet meeting next Wednesday to demonstrate that his administration is serious in wanting to address the 47-year grievances, frustrations and discontent of Sabahans and Sarawakians – making the first Malaysia Day as a national public holiday really worthwhile and meaningful,” he said.
He said Sabahans are disappointed that Najib came to Sabah completely empty-handed for the first Malaysia Day national public holiday in 47 years.
Speaking at the Malam Pakatan Rakyat gathering cum dinner held in Beaufort, Thursday, Lim further contended that if not for People’s Power as represented by the emergence of Pakatan Rakyat, Malaysia Day on September 16 would not have been declared a national public holiday by the Prime Minister even after 47 years.
He said that this was why the people of Sabah and Sarawak do not want to see the declaration of Malaysia Day as a national public holiday as a mere political ploy.
“But they want it to symbolise a belated recognition by and wake-up call for the Federal Government after 47 years to take seriously and address full-heartedly the frustrations, grievances and alienations suffered by Sabahans and Sarawakians for three generations at not being given full and fair treatment as Malaysian citizens – by removing once and for all the nagging sense felt by Sabahans and Sarawakians that they are not accorded recognition and rights as first-class citizens of Malaysia,” he said.
“This is why Sabahans and Sarawakians expect more than having Malaysia Day declared as a national public holiday – why Sabahans expect Najib to come to Kota Kinabalu and Sandakan on the occasion of Malaysia Day to announce concrete measures how the Barisan Nasional Federal Government proposes to begin to address and resolve their 47-year-old grievances, frustrations and disaffections at not being given fair and proper treatment under the Malaysian sun.
“For a start, how does Najib propose to fully implement the Twenty-Point Agreement which was the “magna carta” for Sabah in 1963 to join hands with Sarawak, Malaya and Singapore to establish the new nation and federation of Malaysia?” he asked.
Lim said this was especially significant citing there has been repeated calls by United Pasokmomogun Kadazan Dusun Murut Organisation (Upko), a component party of the Sabah Barisan Nasional, urging the Federal Government to fulfill what have been promised in the 20 Points Agreement.
He then highlighted that one of the Twenty Points Agreement referred to a “proper Ministerial system in North Borneo” had been violated in the past 47 years.
“Otherwise we would have seen a fair distribution of the state’s wealth and resources among Sabahans and not the abnormality firstly, of Sabah which started as one of the richest states in Malaysia deteriorating to be one of the poorest states after 47 years;
“And secondly, the emergence of a coterie of new rich revolving around the Ministers and ex-state ministers and their cronies while the overwhelming majority of Sabahans remain poor,” he contended.
He reiterated that a Royal Commission of Inquiry should be established to look into the 20-Point Agreement and to conduct a full and comprehensive investigation into nearly five decades of misrule, corruption and gross abuse of power in the state which negated and nullified the pledge of the Sabah Magna Carta for “a proper Ministerial system” in Sabah.
///SERI KEMBANGAN, Sept 19 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak underscored today the necessity for fair policies and systems under the principle of inclusiveness in his 1 Malaysia concept./// – The Malaysian Insider
Talk is cheap.
Najib must walk the talk to show he is not playing the diplomat’s card.
If Najib really meant what he said, he should target to fill at least half the 59 Federal departments in Sabah with Sabahans as heads before the next Malaysia Day celebration on September 16, 2011.
No point to continue begging … already 47 years … and should receive an award for being the most humble people in the universe … but do not underestimate what people can do … it is only natural that when being pushed to the corner, even a dog will bite back … time for Sabah and Sarawak to wake up … vote for DAP … kick out BN and send BN to hell.
The people of Sabah and Sarawak cannot be faulted for viewing Najib’s 1st Malaysia Day visit as just another UNMOB political sandiwara. Afterall, the same wayang kulit has been played over and over again for the past 47 years; they have gotten tired of being made fools of by UMNOB’s sweet-talking and empty promises. Now is the time they demand for what rightly should be theirs.
My take is that Najib will turn a deaf ear to their calls for the Federal Government to fulfill the 20/18 points agreements. Between Borneonisation and UMNOnisation, Najib can only choose one.
Sabahans and Sarawakians can only realize their dreams under a new Federal Government headed by PR. Your time kneeling to and pleading with UMNO could be better spent on creating awareness among your own people to stand up to UNMOB’s 47 years of bullying antics. Come election time, in One Thunderous Voice say ”TAK NAK” to UNMOB/BN
If federal govt does not honor the 20 point agreement, can Sabah and Sarawak then do the same by pulling out?
Supported by the many bad news plaguing BN this time around
PR will be on course and gaining ground
Although BN’s pre-election money politics abound
Educating the people will have their influence drowned
BN must be given a knockout punch this 13th round
To ensure that PR will be victoriously crowned
And that BN/UMNO will be opposition-bound
Under PR’s govt Malaysia will be more safe and sound
Save Sarawak
Save Sabah
Save Malaysia
Say “TAK NAK” to BN/UMNO. Vote PR
Actually the line ‘Save Sabah for Sabahan’ and ‘Save Sarawak for Sarawakian’ is a very good theme. It works even in entrenched backward rural areas who likely DO NOT EVEN know they have been invaded ALL these years.
But the message have to be taken inland early and for a long time. Like last year..
Interesting to note that english is actually the official language of sabah and sabah has no official religion. (I read this somewhere ok.) Now these are two fantastic advantages; first, the language of the world and second, no sticky religious issues (but there is no guarantee, I know). And sabah is resource rich. Heck sabah should be like singapore. In fact sabah ought to be better than singapore by now. But of course umno seems to think that malaysia was formed to help the sabahans (and sarawakians). So to umnoputras, you sabahans owe them a mighty favour. And you fellas have no right to demand for all sorts of things. In terms of priority, cintanegara will eat the rambutan white flesh and you sabahans will eat the red hairy rambutan skin. So there, dont forget your position and status in the country.
And yes I forgot. Finally. D to you sabahans.
“Fill at least half the 59 Federal departments in Sabah with Sabahans as heads”
Wow, seow liao ah? UmnoB n Perkosa beh tahan 1
Cannot lah, if like dat, UmnoBputras fr West M’sia how 2 cari makan?
Y change? D 20-Point Agreement on Borneonisation 4 show only lah
Oredi 47 yrs gone n oredi pattern set, Sabah n Sarawak fixed deposit, OK 1, Y change?
LKS n DAP, lu really kacau 1, Utusan M will go after U 1, just watch lah
///KUALA LUMPUR: Efforts to transform the country must be based on inclusiveness, says Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, or else the Government Transformation Plan, Economic Transformation Programme and New Economic Model will all come to nought.
“All these will not be meaningful unless there is the notion of being inclusive,” he said at the 1Malaysia Malayalee community luncheon in Seri Kembangan yesterday.
The event, attended by 7,500 people, was billed as the largest Malayalee gathering ever in Malaysia.
Present were MIC president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu, PPP president Datuk M. Kayveas, PPP vice-president Datuk Maglin D’Cruz, MIC vice-president M. Saravanan and All Malaysia Malayalee Association president Tan Sri Ravindran Menon.
Read more: Najib thanks the Malayalees http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/4mala/Article/#ixzz101p5tqBS///
The Malayali from Krelela India did not attend. If he had accepted his Malayali ancestry and not chosen to be a Malay, there would certainly be no racial polarization in this country. Imagine how one person out of four million, at the time he was born, could have caused so much trouble for the nation. That is a proof of the butterfly effect, a bad one that is. How we wish he did not survive his birth.
To finance and upkeep a House of Corrupts requires Najib to be financially strong and principled. Financially strong, yes!….only to UMNO. Principle? it will be a tough call….perhaps, asking this UMNO PM to scrape the bottom of the barrel.
Borneonisation of Sabah’s public service is point 8 of the 20 point agreement.
It is interesting to note too the following:-
Point 1 – On Religion, “while there was no objection to Islam being the national religion of Malaysia there should be no State religion in North Borneo, and the provisions relating to Islam in the present Constitution of Malaya should not apply to North Borneo”. This bears on the Allah controversy.
Point 7 – on secession, “There should be no right to secede from the Federation.” To talk about it is arguably sedituous.
Point 3 – on the constitution, “Whilst accepting that the present Constitution of the Federation of Malaya should form the basis of the Constitution of Malaysia, the Constitution of Malaysia should be a completely new document drafted and agreed in the light of a free association of states and should not be a series of amendments to a Constitution drafted and agreed by different states in totally different circumstances. A new Constitution for North Borneo (Sabah) was of course essential.”
Point 3 is interesting. Unless the points in the 20 point agreement are incorporated in our Federal Constitution what are their legal status?
One may view the 20 point agreement as an international treaty of binding effect but thats more the case of a treaty between 2 sovereign states….
Problem here is that Sabah & Sarawak are no more sovereign states, being absorbed into Malaysia. So how does one enforce point 3? Does PR endorse this?
How about BN or PR to follow the Chinese model,treating Sabah and Sarawak as a kind of ” Special Administrative States ” (SAS) quite like Hong Kong and Macau.Will this solve the problem,Jeffrey ? Since the two states have been absorbed into Malaysia,though they shouldn’t be in the first place as Sabah and Sarawak are co-founders of Malaysia. Would you agree this problem has to be solved,failing which there won’t be much happiness between East and West Malaysia ?
Re #12 – the concept of “Special Administrative States ” (SAR) is the best from East Malaysian view points (in terms of autonomy) but its just too much and unrealistic to hope for in Malaysian context.
SAR is unique, one of the kind in the world developed by pragmatic genius of Deng Xiaoping. The systems between Communist China and Capitalist Hong Kong (HK) are so completely different, that the continuance of HK and its prosperity, leading China (lagging behind in pro market policies/reforms) justify such an arrangement.
However conditions are not the same between East and West Malaysia where legacy of British governance administrative and ideological system about the same, and West Malaysia leads the way in development…
China had to amend Article 31 of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China that now authorizes the National People’s Congress to create SARs and to create a Basic Law which provides those regions with a high degree of autonomy, a separate political system and a capitalist economy under the principle of “One country, two systems” proposed by Deng Xiaoping.
To honour and give real legal effect to the 20 point Sabah agreement, we too will have to amend our Federal Constitution. there’s no escape from that.
But IF we are prepared all the way to do that – ie amending our Constitution – we may as well amend it such as to give “teeth” and effect to incorporate and protect the salient arrangements of the Sabah 20 point Agreement in letter and spirit of what point 3 of the treaty says, which does not necessarily imply or require that we have to go all the way to the extreme to create SARs like the way China does vis-à-vis HK Macau and in future Taiwan due to their very different conditions and circumstances.
That’s why I ask if PR is prepared to uphold point 3.
Thanks Jeffrey, I think PR has got your message as PR leaders have signed pledge to return oil and gas and the 20 points to Sabah and Sarawak among many other goodies while in Keningau,Sabah last week,should PR won the 13th GE and formed the Federal government. I pray that all Sabahans/Sarawakians just do it.
Outsiders feeling cheated n bad 4 Sabahans n Sarawakians
But Sabahans n Sarawakians r blissfully satisfied under BN, exploited n happy with whatever little bribe fr BN, n continue 2 vote 4 BN