"To know and not do anything would have been wrong. The question now is what will the current Sabah Government and our Sabahan Federal Ministers do about it?" he asked.
"When informed about the 40 per cent entitlement, like the cancellation of 999 land leases,I could either turn away or do nothing, like what some current Ministers and some ex-Chief Ministers are doing.
"Or I could give my best input and risk being criticised. It matters not that my term as Chief Minister 17 years ago was for two out of 52 years," he said in a statement here, Wednesday.
Responding to the statement by another ex-Chief Minister Tan Sri Harris Salleh, Yong said Harris should not be cursed for failing to claim the "40 per cent entitlement" contained in the Federal Constitution.
"There have been six Prime Ministers, nine Federal Finance Ministers, 13 Sabah Chief Ministers and nine Sabah Finance Ministers. There have been countless officers at the Attorney-General Chambers and finance ministries at both State and Federal levels responsible for drawing up the budgets.
"After 52years of Federal budgets,it is only now the '40 per cent entitlement' has been successfully
brought to the mainstream of Malaysian policy making," he said.
Yong gave credit to Star Sabah Chairman Datuk Dr Jeffery Kitingan for discovering this and the courage of Foreign Minister Datuk Anifah Aman to take this up all the way to the Prime Minister that deserved recognition.
According to him, Anifah was taking great risks of offending Umno and the Prime Minister.
"He might even lose his job over this '40 per cent' claim and other Sabah rights."
"Anifah and Dr Jeffrey deserve Sabahan's support in the fight for Sabah rights. I ask Harris, are you not a Sabahan too? Where Harris, myself and other ex-Chief Minister did not succeed, we should now help the new generation of Sabahans to succeed," he said.
Yong said this "40 per cent entitlement" is neither
the first nor the last of discoveries and ideas on Sabah's struggle for full autonomy.
"With the Federal Government now dependent on Sabah and Sarawak, a window of opportunity exists for the Borneo states to redress the injustices of the past.
"The awakening of Sarawakians and even Johor highlights that Malaysia is a federation of equal partners, not a unitary state with over-centralised powers in Putrajaya.
"I agree with Harris that we should look at other aspects of Sabah rights. Harris could use his influence to seek the return of Labuan and federal agencies to Sabah, to get Felda to hand over its 200,000 acres of land to settlers, tighten immigration into Sabah,increase oil royalties for Sabah and secure Sabah rights over the newly discovered oil and gas at Esszone,"he said.
In another statement earlier, Yong said a follow-up, closed-door discussion with Anifah, Dr Jeffrey, lawyer Ansari Abdullah, academician Zainal Ajamain, himself and others had gone through all the issues relating to the "40 per cent entitlement" under the Federal Constitution.
"All that is left now is the implementation. If the Federal Government is sincere, then the Prime Minister should make a firm commitment to honour the 40 Per cent entitlement in his national budget speech on October 23.
"With still three months to go, our Federal and Sabah Ministers and MPs have a duty to make sure that the Prime Minister cum Finance Minister makes a firm commitment to implement this 40 per cent entitlement in his budget speech," he said.
Yong said that another entitlement of Sabahans and Sarawakians was the Borneonisation of the public services.
The Borneonisation case filed in 2011 to compel the Federal Government to implement the Borneonisation of the public services as provided for in the Malaysia Agreement 1963 would go before the Federal Court on Aug 20,2015 on the issue of locus standi, he said.
"If the Federal court rules against the plaintiffs, then it means that we have come to the end of the judicial process in Malaysia. Sabahans would then have no choice but to either initiate legal action in the United Kingdom or to petition the United Nations.
"The internationalisation of the Borneonisation case could only be avoided if the Federal Government implemented the Borneonisation of the public services without any more delay," he said.
Yong claimed Sabahans were fed up with committees after committees to "study" Sabah issues as though the issues are new. "One glaring example is the RCI report that has gone nowhere. What has been done about the RCI Technical Committee which has yet to report to another committee known as the Main Committee?
"There is not even a reply to our submission on the proposed Sabah IC submitted to the Technical Committee," he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment