Datuk Dr. Jeffrey Kitingan, in saying this, said the amount of potential abuse that can arise from such an exercise is huge, and will worsen the situation for the indigenous peoples of Sabah in terms of their already diminishing share of the state’s demographic.
The president of Parti Solidariti Tanahairku (STAR SABAH) said he has received countless number of calls from the people who raised their deep concern about the proposal, questioning the real intention of the plan.
“They believe that there is an underlyng motive in it, and they, as indigenous people, feel it is a dangerous threat,” Dr. Jeffrey said. “Most are accusing the chief minister of purposely finding a way to legalise illegals, and that once this operation starts there is no way it can be controlled despite the assurance by the chief minister that the exercise will follow certain procedure and if ‘both parents are foreigners, we will deport them’”.
Dr. Jeffrey who is Member of Parliament for Keningau and assemblyman for Tambunan also warned that the definition of “Malaysian parent” is subject to at least two interpretations, one of which includes illegal immigrants who have been legalised and given blue ICs.
“Hence an illegal immigrant parent can be called a Malaysian. And the children of illegally-issued blue ICs holder are now Malaysians,” he reminded. “There is a huge number of such people in Sabah, while the actual number of real locals who got married to undocumented foreigners is actually minuscule.”
He called on the state government to first all resolve the problem of the ICs in Sabah in which hundreds of thousands have been issued illegally or through the back door, before going into the matter of stateless children.
“With this proposed exercise, there will be new blue ICs for such stateless children and newly arrived foreigners. This will amount in the hundreds of thousands,” he warned. “Ultimately the exercise will make a tremendous gain for the people who are now stateless and illegal towards becoming the dominant group in Sabah.”
He questioned why the chief minister is making foreigner legalisation the number one agenda of this new government. He observes that the chief minister is obviously in a hurry to achieve as much as possible in foreigner legalisation in the shortest possible time.
“And when the opposition voice their concern, he calls it ‘baseless accusation’. Why is he not the more pressing problems of Sabah such as our dire economic situation as depressed prices of crops and high prices of petrol and other consumer goods. No less important is the need to repair and maintain the dilapidated infrastructure in many places,” he said.
He said the people urging his to raise alarm on the issue are so angry that they might be willing to resort to a massive demonstration soon of the proposal is not withdrawn, and that, he said, is the other danger.
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