-Kim Quek, August 11, 2012.
COMMENT On
the day of an anticipated major announcement by Prime Minister Najib
Razak on the terms of reference for the proposed royal commission of
inquiry on illegal immigrants in Sabah, it is pertinent to take stock of
the gravity of this menace in the state.
In the past four decades, the population of Sabah has increased by
almost five folds (from 650,000 in 1970 to 3.12 million in 2010), much
of it consists of illegal immigrants or their descendants.
Such
population implosion has not only created unbearable strain on Sabah’s
social and economic fabric, but it has also stripped original Sahahans
of their sovereignty, in that a large chunk of its present electorate
are made up of these illegal immigrants who have been illicitly granted
voting rights through a massive clandestine operation known as ‘Project
M’ (M stands for Mahathir).
This group of illegal voters, known as phantom voters, has now become
the kingmaker, who can tilt the balance of power not only in Sabah in
the coming elections, but also in Putrajaya. This is because a major win
by BN in the state, as it has done in the past (thanks to the phantom
voters, of course), will help BN to ward off Pakatan Rakyat’s challenge
through a simple parliamentary majority.
While many have heard of the phenomenon of the Sabah phantom voters,
perhaps not so many are familiar with the hows and whys of it. For this
reason, we should perhaps seek enlightenment from justice Muhammad Kamil
Awang’s judgment annulling the Likas election in Sabah in June 2001.
Court judgment
In a rare display of judicial independence under former prime
minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s rule, Muhammad in his judgment chronicled
details of a massive illicit campaign to convert illegal immigrants
into voters through the unlawful issue of blue ICs and the unlawful
registration of these IC holders into the electoral rolls.
These details of illegal activities presented in court included many
instances of witnesses’ testimonies, affidavits and incriminating
government and political party correspondence and circulars.
These evidence point conclusively to the involvement of the National
Registration Department (NRD), Election Commission (EC), police and Umno
officials in a joint conspiracy to massively convert illegal Philippine
and Indonesian immigrants into citizens and voters. In fact, this voter
scam was so serious that it was described by Muhammad as only the “tip
of an iceberg”.
Muhammad’s
judgment, which has not been disputed to date, also gave details of how
repeated official complaints from the opposition parties on such
fraudulent practices had been consistently stonewalled by the
authorities all the way up to the highest levels of government,
including a rejection for debate in Parliament.
In fact, there was evidence that even the highest authorities in NRD and EC had been incriminated in this phantom voters scam.
What motivated these highest civil servants to commit such treasonous
acts against the Sabah state in unlawfully admitting these hundreds of
thousands of illegal immigrants as citizens and voters?
Personal gains can be ruled out, as these are more than offset by the
heavy punishment that can be meted out for such high crimes of treason
against the country.
Umno political strategy
The only plausible explanation is that this is the political strategy
of the Umno leadership to regain political power in Sabah from the
Kadazan (mainly Christian) dominated PBS. The latter has won every Sabah
election since 1986 save the last one in 1999.
It does not take a genius to find out why. Until the last election in
1999, the Sabah electorate had been such that non-Muslim Kadazans and
Chinese overwhelmingly outnumbered Malays (all Muslims) and other
Muslims.
With Umno’s heavy emphasis on racial and religious privileges, which
alienated the non-Malays and non-Muslims, there was virtually no chance
that the Umno dominated BN could unseat the PBS government unless there
was a drastic restructuring of the ratio of Muslim dominated electorates
to non-Muslim dominated electorates and re-drawing of the electoral
boundaries.
And this is exactly what happened. Through the massive infusion of
illegal Philippine and Indonesian immigrants (who are all Muslims) into
the electoral roll, as well as gerrymandering, Muslim majority
constituencies in Sabah in the 1999 electoral roll had suddenly and
inexplicably increased from 30 percent to 50 percent of the total
constituencies of 48 within a short period of five years.
Given this numerical boost, BN swept the 1999 Sabah election, after
employing every dirty election trick available under the sun, including
the usual blatant abuses of government agencies and resources and the
mass media which was completely under the thumb of the ruling coalition.
With these phantom voters as bedrock of support, Umno has dominated political power in Sabah ever since.
Chance of a lifetime
If the coming announcement by Najib is to have any meaning to
Sabahans, the proposed RCI must aimed at firstly restoring their
democratic rights by purging the electoral roll of phantoms, and
secondly solving their social and economic plight through proper
management of these illegal immigrants, including phased repatriation
and effective measures to prevent further influx.
Umno has never been so vulnerable of losing power as it is now.
Hence, it is the chance of a lifetime for Sabahans to demand and get
what is due to them – a fair solution to the illegal immigrants and
phantom voters menace. There is absolutely no need for them to
compromise.
Unless they are fully convinced that Umno’s offer is sincere, genuine
and certain to succeed, they must opt for the alternative – which is to
vote the other political coalition into power.
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