Warisan deputy president Darell Leiking contends that two succeeding generations of 400,000 ‘Projek IC’ beneficiaries make up one million of Sabah's population.
KOTA KINABALU: Parti Warisan Sabah (Warisan) deputy president Darell Leiking is pushing the federal government to come clean on how many illegal immigrants exist in Sabah.
In a statement issued today, Leiking insisted that a breakdown of citizens versus non-citizens be made public, in light of the announcement by the Department of Statistics Malaysia that Sabah’s population stood at 3.9 million.
“Who are these people who make up the 3.9 million people currently living in Sabah?” he said.
“It was alleged in a book by Chong Eng Leong, entitled ‘Lest We Forget’, that 400,000 illegal immigrants had been given Malaysian citizenships through the infamous ‘Projek IC’ of the early 1990s.
“So, can we deduce that since no action was taken against Projek IC holders, their two succeeding generations may have made up almost one million of these 3.9 million people?”
The Penampang MP said he believed many Sabahans could still remember Barisan Nasional (BN) state leaders repeatedly saying Chief Minister Musa Aman was going to eradicate the perennial problem of Projek IC and end the issue of illegal immigrants in Sabah for good.
“We now want the Statistics Department to reveal to us just how many remaining illegal immigrants are in its latest census compared with the last two censuses.
“But, most importantly, the government must act responsibly and tell Sabahans in detail just who makes up the 3.9 million people in the state.”
Leiking said the census should also be taken as a reminder to Prime Minister Najib Razak on why Sabah deserved a huge budget.
“Sabah is the second-largest populated state in Malaysia and development should relate to population,” explained Leiking.
“Obviously, one would spend billions of ringgit in places with a high population but this ‘logical thinking’ is clearly missing in Najib and BN.”
According to Leiking, a higher population directly translated into higher revenues from GST collection and taxes, and a greater need for basic infrastructure, education, health, clean water and electricity.
“But we don’t see Najib having realised this. I can only assume that he regards Sabahans as ‘outsiders’.
“Judging from the non-performance of his government on the Malaysia Agreement 1963 and the number of allocations given by him to Sabah from 2013 until now, I truly believe that he does not care a bit if Sabahans support him or otherwise,” he said.
“I say this because the reason is simple: Sabahans only make up 10% of the total population in Malaysia. There may only be 8% eligible Sabahan voters to go against Sarawakian and Malayan voters.”
Worst, Leiking said, Sabah BN leaders had unashamedly praised Najib’s Budget 2018 tabled on Friday despite knowing Sabah was left out in almost every area.
“Perhaps these Sabah BN leaders think that Sabah need not have a high-class train service or LRT network despite the fact that our state is the biggest palm oil and petroleum producer or the second biggest GST contributor as long as these leaders continue to be loved by Najib and are given federal ministerial posts as well as projects,” he said.
“Perhaps Sabahans can personally ask these state BN leaders what they are actually doing because it is now apparent that Najib does not care whether Sabahans support him or not any more.
“It is time for all Sabahans to stand up with dignity and demand that the federal government treat Sabahans with more respect and to reconstitute Sabah, Sarawak and Malaya as equal partners in co-administering the federation.”
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