Can a 'President' Bong Bong Marcos in 2016 take Sabah back? His friends and supporters think so

The success of the next president with regard to Sabah will be hinging on President Aquiino's actions on Sabah today. Either he is a patriot or not. If he is not a patriot, then the next president will need all the luck he can have to take Sabah back...

Supporters of Marcos for president in 2016 believe that unlike Philippines' President Aquino today who has been seen as weakling (using a polite term) and a puppet of Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib, Bong-Bong Marcos (Ferdinand Marcos Jr) will have the courage to press on and re-take Sabah.

From Anne de B, one of the founders of the Sabah Clain Society and the Philippine Sabah Claim Forum, on whether Bong Bong Marcos, if he is elected president, could take back Sabah:

A Bong-Bong Marcos presidency does not guarantee the return of Sabah. No future president can achieve that unless current dispensation paves the way. In order to ensure the likelihood of getting Kuala Lumpur to negotiate with us firmly (during BBM's tenure if he becomes president) the current dispensation must do everything within the next three years to pressure Kuala Lumpur to accept to honour the Manila Accord at the very least.

Realistically, I believe that what a "President" BB Marcos can do come 2016 in the direction of Sabah hinges on what President Aquino does today which means that the current dispensation should show that it behaves, decides and acts in favour of the claim. President Aquino should be behaving today from the standpoint that Sabah is ours by right, historically and legally, eg., [examples of how the current Malacanang tenant shoud behave, decide and act, etc...]

(i) by defending the Tausugs and Suluks in Sabah from human rights violations,
(ii) by removing KL as the panel chair of the so-called GPH-MILF peace talks because you cannot have a fellow with whom you have an outstanding dispute to chair a talk that that fellow himself had engineered - complete stupidity, so anybody but KL or peninsular Malaysia,
(iii) by sending away those Malaysian so-called "peacekeepers" in Mindanao, again, anybody else but not from the country with whom we have an outstanding dispute and not from the country that continues to massacre our people in Sabah,
(iv) by not playing mouthpiece to Najib, certainly not the president of the Republic.

Unless President Aquino does these things within the last three years of his mandate - but which he is not doing at the moment,  the Sabah issue will not be easy for the next president to tackle. 

It is also a matter of military power. If the supporters of Mr Marcos think that he might resort to war - if he is president - in order to get Sabah back, we are not sure that Mr. Marcos, even if he is elected in three years will be able to mount the same action as his father once did. We are almost certain that he will not do it that way. All eyes will be trained at him if he becomes the president and it will not be easy to replicate an Operation Merdeka.

Besides, there is no guarantee that the current PH leadership will be able to organise the country's armed forces to a level that will be on par with that of Malaysia which the next president will need to realistically get Sabah back.

If the country's armed forces are not at that level, there is virtually no possibility that we can take back Sabah by force. You see, it is almost next to impossible for the country to possess the military arsenal required to achieve that sort of operation if the country does not go on a buying spree beginning today and spend at the very least a few hundreds of billions of dollars. 

And even then, there is time constraint to factor in. Even if you order within the next three years, you are not guaranteed that you will have delivery of ships, submarines, attack helicopters, radars, missile systems, etc.,in  two or three and not even 4, 5 years after the order is placed in time for Mr Marcos to launch his "war" to take Sabah back (if that's what his supporters believe he will do if he becomes president.)

But having outlined the downside, we do not suggest that the current leadership give up on Sabah claim. President Aquino must prepare the way for the next president to achieve what he cannot achieve today. It is the least he can do. And obviously, he cannot do that if he accepts to be the little 'toy boy' of Najib.

~~ Admins, Philippine Sabah Claim Forum
30 June 2013

'If we don't pursue our claim to Sabah, we may be doing violence to our Constitution' ~ Ambassador Lauro Baja

The article "Don't play into Malaysia's hands" was written at the height of the Sabah stand-off by former Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Lauro Baja. It is a brief analysis of the Tanduo siege which President Aquino termed a "hopeless cause."

Ambassador Baja warned,"If we do not pursue, we may do violence to our own Constitution, to House Resolution No. 321 adopted on April 24, 1962 and to the Supreme Court decision upholding the validity of RA 5522 and declaring that the PH has title and dominion over Sabah."

FULL ARTICLE: 

‘Don’t play into Malaysia’s hand’
February 27, 2013
By LAURO L. BAJA JR.

THE President has gone on TV appealing and at the same time chastising the Sultan of Sulu over the standoff in Lahad Datu in Sabah.

The next few days will tell the wisdom of doing it in public. His statements and actions give the unintended consequence of leaning on our own nationals over a foreign power. We may be playing into Malaysia’s hands who has been adopting a studied but cavalier attitude over the standoff. They are exercising acts of “effectivités” over Sabah during this standoff by their actions and even by their silence over our naive pronouncements.

“Effectivités” in a territorial dispute between countries gives weight to actual and continued exercise of authority over a territory. This is the basis of the International Court of Justice ’s 2002 decision on the Ligatan Sipadan case where the court awarded the area to Malaysia over Indonesia. Also the same principle in the case between Chile and Peru and between Nicaragua and Guatemala.

The Sabah standoff should rouse the Philippine Rip van Winkle attitude towards our claim to the area. It provides the country with a unique but sensitive opportunity to revisit our claim. If the Philippines can deal with the situation with some diplomatic imagination and finesse it can correct some missteps of the past which led to the current state of helplessness insofar as the issue is concerned.

Those missteps include the abortive “peopling” of Sabah by Filipinos under the Marcos administration which resulted in the Jabidah mnassacre. Also advocating and/or agreeing to a United Nations referendum in Sabah in 1963 without adequate strategic preparations which resulted in adverse outcome for the Philippines.

The solid legal foundation of our claim still exists.

In the transfer of sovereignty document which the Sultan of Sulu signed with the Philippine government, it was expressly provided that the transfer shall be deemed voided if the Philippines shall fail to pursue the claim. The sultan understandably feels he is now free to pursue the claim himself.

The President should find an opportunity to convene the National Security Council to consider the matter. The ramifications of the standoff have far reaching consequences and both the legislative and judicial branches of the government have pronounced themselves on the issue.

As days pass, the confluence of events makes it imperative that the Philippines now define its policy on Sabah. To continue putting the claim in the backburner is not a policy. This is an illusion, a mirage.

Will it be in the national interest to pursue the claim to Sabah? Strong legal grounds still exist although eroded by our statements and actions and inactions. If we do not pursue, then we lay to waste previous international efforts in the UN, in the London and Bangkok talks, in the ICJ, in the Manila Accord of 1963.

If we do not pursue, we may do violence to our own Constitution, to House Resolution No. 321 adopted on April 24, 1962 and to the Supreme Court decision upholding the validity of RA 5522 and declaring that the PH has title and dominion over Sabah.

To study (again!) the legal merits of the claim is to consign it to the backburner for the next fifty years.

It is a sad commnetary on the Philippines if our own nationals should run to the UN because their government cannot protect their rights. This is not the spectacle our country wants to portray to the international community.

It is now urgent to cease to be “confused” and move and act decisively. Time to end the Kabuki play on Sabah.

(The author is a veteran Philippine diplomat. He was the Philippine Permament Representative to the United Nations from May 2003 to  February 2007. Prior to that, he was Foreign Affairs Undersecretary for Policy.)

Link to original story here.

HOW TO HELP SULUK FAMILIES WHO HAVE BEEN UNJUSTLY DEPORTED FROM THEIR HOMELAND BY KUALA LUMPUR

A photo report posted by Philippine Sabah Claim Forum member PManalo; caption reads: "repost from REACT Phil. June 25, 2013 @ 8:05 pm 116 deportees arrived @ Bongao Port, karamihan sa kanila ay menor de edad pa kasama na rin isang 2 kalahating taong gulang na bata at dalawa sa menor de edad na deportees nagkakaroon na ng deperensya sa pagiisip dahil ikunulong daw sila ng 100 days sa tawau sabah malaysia." Also posted on Sabah Claim Society community page. 

Muslim families in Sulu are in dire need of your help for the Tausugs and the Suluks who have gone and continue to go through the most horrendous experience following the Tanduo siege in Sabah. 

While our government is showing sympathy to our kababayans who are convicted of a crime in a foreign country and is taking drastic action to help save their lives, our Muslim families in Sabah are still suffering from the atrocities of Malaysian troops and police authorities without overt sympathy from the tenants of Malacanang.  

Many had been incarcerated and starved before deportation; many have died or been killed and will never see the shores of Sulu; others have left Sabah on their own to escape death. There is a vast number of Suluk "deportees" from their own Sabah homeland who need help. The forced and unjust "deportation" in the most inhuman circumastances has not stopped. Those who have luckily reached the shores of Sulu are in need of food and medicine. The sick, the wounded, the hungry need help. 

Raayat Bangsa Suluk, a charity group by the Kiram family of Sulu, has set up a group on Facebook. The group has just put up a Paypal account through which someone - especially located overseas, who wishes to help can send donation online. If you wish to donate in kind or in person, you can also go to their physical office address. 

Here's their PayPal Account: kiramn@yahoo.com

To donate locally and in person, here's a "how to do it" list from Fatima Shehan Kiram Idjirani of the Raayat Bangsa Suluk:

"If someone asks for our Org's address so they can send donations in kind, please refer them to 1) Address: Suite 2306 Cityland 10 Tower 2, H.V. Dela Costa Street corner Street Makati City 1226; and 2) please go to the Files Tab of this group page and forward to them the Donation Form. The form is much needed for auditing purposes. Thank you :)"

Anyone interested may also download a form from the group by clicking on the following Facebook link: Raayat Bangsa Suluk

Another organisation through which help to our Suluks families may be coursed is One World Institute, Inc., a non-profit organisation, headed by one of our compatriots, Yolanda Ortega Stern, who has been doing this silently for years now. This organization has provided livelihood programs for our people. If you have a Facebook account, please visit their Facebook page and "LIKE" it to know more. You can get more information from the page how to help. Link: One World Institute

Please visit their Facebook link to view page and "LIKE" it. There's some information about the organization and how it provides a livelihood program for the people there. Our compatriot, Yolanda Ortega Stern heads this organization and has been doing charitable projects silently without fanfare. But the organisation deserves to be noticed and those who can help may do so. 

Here's something we have copied and pasted from One World Institute:

One World Institute will be initiating a new pilot project in Sulu in Coconut Processing to help our OWI community earn money for their daily bread. They will grate and press the coconuts to sell the "sapal" and the cold squeezed virgin coconut oil. Filipino innovative technology for low cost production in an area that suffers lack of electricity, will be utilized. 

We will also be helping TechnoteBambooPhil promote their Bamboo project by encouraging growing bamboo wherever we can. They now have a nursery in Kidapawan, Cotabato. Rimmon Paren has trained and is ready. The OWI community will initially join in providing the bamboo to them. Seedlings are now for sale. 

To our partners, you can be an investor/partner or donate Php 55 K for a coconut processing machine. Or you can donate bamboo seedlings purchased in Kidapawan. 

OWI will provide the logistics and market for all the products, using our Seaweed Farm Associations as the model. The community owns the project, OWI manages, markets, and they get all the income. 

OWI does not charge administrative fees from any donations. What you give is what they get. 

Our Seaweed Farms continue to thrive. Hundreds of families are subsisting today on the income they derive from selling their dried seaweeds. More could be done for them if we had a processing plant for secondary processing. We will be experimenting with using the same machine to chop seaweed as well. 

OWI, AAI, and IPI will join again in the sharing of hypertensive medicines and books to hard hit areas where libraries perished during Pablo. Dengue is on the rise again. 

So join our Coconut Army, the Seaweed Navy and the Bamboo Brigade. Plant bamboo. 

Thank you to all our volunteers and partners as we change gears from wheelchair distribution to concentrate our scarce resources on old and new projects that help our communities put food on the table. We have listened to the OWI communities. "We cannot eat books" is a desperate commentary on the hard times. 

Join us one and all, in the projects that fill the heart. The difference is YOU. 

For more, click here.

NOTE BENE: We, the Admins of the Philippine Sabah Claim Forum, its Defenders community page and its sister sites on FB and on the worldwide web, would like to emphasize, that we are not in any manner connected to the above organisations and are in no way responsible for these organizations. We have posted the above sites on the Philippine Sabah Claim Forum and its sister sites on Facebook and in the Group's blogs in response to enquiries by some members on how they could help. The posts on how to help Suluks in dire need following their forced and unjustified deportation from Sabah are a PUBLIC SERVICE. Thank you.

~~ Administrators

• Philippine Sabah Claim Forum
• Defenders of the Philippine Sabah & Spratly Claims
• Sabah Claim Society

28 June 2013

We are asking President Aquino to be a patriot in the truest sense of the term: To 'love' his own (people) first and the Peninsular Malaysians only a distant second

We would like to clarify the belief that Sabah claim has been submitted to the International Court of Justice for Arbitration: The Sabah dispute has not been brought to the ICJ for arbitration because up until now, Malaysia has refused to honor the Manila Accord which is all about solving this thorny issue. The Manila Accord is a UN treaty (8029) signed by the chief executives of three nations in 1963, namely Republic of Indonesia, Malaya Federation and the Republic of the Philippines.

The ICJ will not entertain Philippine case if Malaysia does not accept ICJ jurisdiction over the case. Both countries must agree to do it.

It is incumbent upon the Philippine president to demand Najib Razak of the Malaysia Federation to honor the Manila Accord in order to try to solve the impasse. If the Philippine president refuses to do it, he will not be serving the interest of his country and his people but will be seen as one who is serving the interest of Kuala Lumpur.

President Aquino has a responsibility as president to do what is right to preserve the integrity of the Philippine Republic and a moral and legal obligation to fight for the rights of his people.

We agree that the job of being president of the country is not easy but we are convinced that President Aquino was aware of the difficulties and the problems that would face him before he ran for president. And we are also convinced that he was aware of the Sabah dispute before he "applied" for the job.

To try to bring the Sabah issue to the ICJ, will be an "easier road" to take than the road of an armed conflict which might happen again if the President decides to keep the Sabah claim issue in the back burner.

We are asking President Aquino to be a patriot in the truest sense of the term: To 'love' his own (people) first and the Peninsular Malaysians only a distant second.

~~ Admins, Philippine Sabah Claim Forum
27 June 2013

Sabah's sovereignty 1946 - 1963: Compromised by the British colonisation but belonged legally to Sultanate of Sulu

UNDERSTANDING THE SABAH PROBLEM 

One factor that is essential in the comprehension of the Sabah problem is to understand that Sabah was only officially colonised by the British Crown only in 1946 which means that UNTIL THEN, North Borneo (Sabah) WAS PART of the Sultanate of Sulu although leased. 

Despite Britain's official colonisation of Sabah from 1946 until 1963, it is my opinion that Sabah's sovereignty, although compromised by the British colonisation, still legally belonged to the Sultanate of Sulu. However, we all know that the Sultanate of Sulu ceded full sovereignty of Sabah to the Philippine Republic on 12 Septemeber 1962 while it was still a colony of Britain.

On 31 July 1963, prior to the creation of the Malaysia Federation, the Manila Accord was signed by three heads of state namely, Macapagal of the Ph ilippines, Soekarno of Indonesia and Rahman of the Malaya Federation (which was not yet Malaysia Federation). Registered as United Nations Treaty 8029, Section 12 of the Manila Accord stipulated that Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, on behalf of the Malaya Federation, agreed that the Philippine Sabah claim would not be extinguished by the then to-be-created Malaysia Federation (which was to be created later on 16th September 1963.)
 
On 31 August 1963, Britain granted Sabah, which had been under British Crown control since 1946 (and whose sovereignty rights had been ceded the year before to the Republic of the Phlippines), its independence.

On 16 September 1963 or sixteen days after Britain granted Sabah its independence, and despite PH protests, it was annexed to a new federation in the making called MALAYSIA instead of returning it either to the Sultanate of Sulu or to the Republic of the Philippines which had already inherited sovereignty rights over Sabah from the Sultanate by virtue of the transfer on 12 September 1962.
 
On 18 September 1968, while Malaysia had taken de facto control of Sabah, the Republic of the Philippines enacted an act - AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION ONE OF REPUBLIC ACT NUMBERED THIRTY HUNDRED AND FORTY-SIX, ENTITLED “AN ACT TO DEFINE THE BASELINES OF THE TERRITORIAL SEA OF THE PHILIPPINES” - to ammend our baselines and known today as Republic Act 5446 which acknowledges title and dominion over Sabah, thus by PH law, Sabah is Philippine territory. RA 5446 is still in vigour. 

As Law Professor Isagani Cruz says:

"President Noynoy faces an insoluble dilemma. If he believes that Sabah is part of the Philippines, he has to defend Sabah because Malaysia is attacking it. If he does not believe that Sabah is part of the Philippines, he opens himself up to impeachment, because Philippine law says that Sabah is part of the Philippines and he is sworn to uphold Philippine law. Talking of a conspiracy does not solve the problem; in fact, it is irrelevant if there is or there is no conspiracy. The dilemma has to do simply with his stand on Sabah itself."

To my mind, the Sultanate of Sulu, and by extension the royal heirs, is irrelevant in the PH claim because Sabah is already PH territory by PH law. The Philippine Republic, however, has contractual obligations which it signed when it accepted from the Sultanate of Sulu the full transfer of sovereignty rights in 1962 and one of these contractual obligations is to prosecute the claim and in so doing, help the Sultante of Sulu's proprietary rights to be recognised. So we cannot actually take it against the Sultanate for feeling doubly rebuffed. It is the Philippine Republic's contractual obligation to do it and the Government has been remiss in its obligations.

NB: The relevant point in the Sabah question is THE NINE SULTANATE HEIRS and not whoever the sultan is. The Philippine Government must not use the Kirams' intra-family bickering as an excuse NOT to perform the Republic's contractual obligation.

Nota Bene: OTHER VERY IMPORTANT NOTE THAT EVERYONE MUST KNOW: When the Sabah lease was signed 134 years ago -- on the 22nd of January 1878, between the Sultanate of Sulu & Sabah and two foreign businessmen, the Sultanate ensured that their rights to Sabah ownership were protected with this all encompassing moral and legal clause  clearly spelled out in the lease contract, to wit (Restrictive clause): 

"...but the rights and powers hereby leased shall not be transferred to any nation, or a company of other nationality, without the consent of Their Majesties Government." 

Related story in this blog link: Nemo nos impune lacessit (No one hits us with impunity)
Link to Republic Act 5446 /

~~ By Anne de Bretagne
For the Defenders of the Philippine Sabah Claim
05 March 2013

Kris Aquino and the Sultan of Johor: President's sister "cavorts with the enemy", a very public slap to the Tausugs in Sabah

We agree that "It was insensitive of Kris Aquino to feature the Sultan of Johor at the time when the wounds of the February-March Sabah bloodfight have not healed and the root of the problem has not been addressed."

Our question: Was the meeting between Kris Aquino and the Sultan of Johor of a political or personal flirtation nature? Whatever it was, we believe that the meeting is sending all the wrong signals to the people Sulu, the Tausugs, the Suluks, the Sultanate of Sulu and the Filipino nation including to the political aparatchiks in Kuala Lumpur.

We frankly don't care even if she 'screws' or 'beds' all the sultans of Malaysia if she does it discreetly but what we do care about is that because she is the sister of President NoyNoy Aquino, a showbiz person in her own right, her very public move is a subliminal message from Malacanang to the Kuala Lumpur royalties and politicians that NoyNoy Aquino is officially paving the way for the giving up of the nation's sovereignty right over Sabah.

The country has an outstanding issue with Kuala Lumpur. Many of our countrymen were brutalised, and murdered by Malaysian troops in the recent Kuala Lumpur attacks on Lahad Datu. Many are facing prison sentences and even the death penalty in Malaysia. This callous move by Kris Aquino is like a slap to those Tausugs in Sabah who have been fighting for a piece of dignity. 

For President Aquino's sister to be seen "cavorting with the enemy" is really despicable in the extreme.

~~ Admins, Philippine Sabah Claim Forum
20 June 2013

Report below:

Kris Aquino and the Sultan of Johor
From  the Blog of Ellen Tordesillas

It was insensitive of Kris Aquino to feature the Sultan of Johor at the time when the wounds of the February-March Sabah bloodfight have not healed and the root of the problem has not been addressed. 

Tuesday’s feature of Kris TV was the Sultan of Johor, Ibrahim Ismail, a close friend of the Aquino’s. 

Kris related that her family’s closeness with the Sultan of Johor, Ibrahim Ismail, dates back to their Boston stay in the mid’80s. The Sultan was a student in the United States at that time. Internet search showed that he received military training in the US–at Fort Benning, Georgia and later at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. 

Kris said the image that she had of the Sultan during their Boston meetings was Ibrahim driving a Rolls Royce.

The Sultan showed off his collection of expensive cars, numbering 300. It is reported that the Johor Sultan and President Aquino share a passion for luxury cars.

Kris excitedly quipped while she was touring the Sultan’s air-conditioned garage, “I’ll show Noy the video and he’ll come.”

The Lahad Datu siege in March this year, which was precipitated by the decision of the Sultan of Sulu Jamalul Kiram III to press their ownership of a large part of Sabah, now one of the 13 states of Malaysia despite the claim of the Philippines over the oil and mineral rich territory , some three-fourths of it was given by the Sultan of Brunei to the Sultan of Sulu in 1704 as a reward for the latter’s help in suppressing a rebellion.

Early February, some 80 to 100 men led by Raja Muda Agbimuddin Kiram, brother of Jamalul Kiram III, arrived in the coastal village of Lahad Datu in Sabah and resisted attempts by Malaysian authorities to expel them. The fighting spread to the town of Semporna. One of the Malaysian policemen killed was L/Kpl Mohd Azrol Tukiran, a close friend of the Johor prince, Tuanku Laksamana Tunku Abdul Jalil, who is also a member of the Malaysian police.

A Malaysian newspaper reported that the Sultan of Johor wept over the policeman’s death saying the victim and his son” close friends and even slept next to each other during their police special forces training in Ulu Kinta in Perak.”

Link to original article: aquino-and-the-sultan-of-johor/

Cobbold Commission 1962 Sabah referendum was a sham: Cobbold Commission heard HALF A PERCENT (0.5%) of the total population of North Borneo and Sarawak

MALAYSIA HAS ALWAYS PROPAGATED THE LIE that "majority of the Sabah population" voted for Sabah to join the future Malaysia Federation when the same "majority of Sabahans" went through a political process that was the Cobbold Commission referendum in 1962 which Kuala Lumpur officials and their cronies in Sabah -- and which, surprisingly, has been adopted by some well known supporters of President Aquino too -- that made Sabah's 1963 incorporation into the 1963 Malaysia Federation legal. Well, truth is buoyant as one of the Admins would say... Tough luck but there was no referendum in Sabah as such! 

The truth is that the so-called referendum in Sabah in 1962 was a sham! In addition to what other Sabahans have been saying, disputing the veracity of Kuala Lumpur claims about the Sabah referendum in 1962, a member of Najib's own Barisan Nasional party herself now effectively re-affirms what we in the Philippine Sabah Claim Forum have been saying all along, i.e., that the Cobbold Commission referendum in Sabah was nothing but a sham. 

We are posting the entirety of a piece by Nilakrisna James (in picture), Sabah lawyer and politician who also happens to be a member of Malaysia ruling party and Najib Razak's party, the  Barisan Nasional, which was published in the Borneo Insider at the height of the Sultanate of Sulu & North Borneo army siege of Tanduo in Sabah early this year. ~~ Admins, Defenders of the Philippine Sabah & Spratly Claims

February, 14, 2013 - 8:33 am

The kingmakers of Borneo

In 1962, the Cobbold Commission that heard HALF A PERCENT (0.5%) of the total population of North Borneo and Sarawak decided that this represented an affirmative decision to proceed with the signing of the Malaysia Agreement, even though a significant proportion of the 0.5% who bothered to respond to the Cobbold Commission had expressed reservations to the idea of forming Malaysia and requested more time.
By Nilakrisna James

IN 2011, the late Datuk Amar James Wong Kim Min, former Minister of the State Government of Sarawak, handed me an autographed copy of his book, “The Birth of Malaysia”.

Despite the United Borneo Front’s proposal to have this coveted piece of literature as part of the history textbooks in the national curriculum for Secondary Schools, many are still deprived access to this book and are completely unaware that the contents of this book merely includes the essential reports prior to the formation of Malaysia in 1963. Within these reports are essential viewpoints and insights into what the people of North Borneo (Sabah) and Sarawak wanted from the Central Government of the proposed Federation of Malaysia, now known as the Malaysian Federal Government.

There is no point harping on racial or religious grounds about the consequences of the IC issue in the RCI if we do not remember that these issues were the very fears expressed in the reports that were made and drafted over 50 years ago.

I consider it my duty to the nation as an ordinary citizen to now progressively work through these reports and summarise the key points of these reports prior to the election so that we will make an informed decision about who we really want as the masters of our economic fate in Borneo. I am writing this in response to the illegal IC debate which I believe goes to the very root of the issue of a breach of Sabah’s territorial integrity and the heart of our future political security.

The Malaysia Agreement 1963

The Malaysia Agreement was signed on the 9th July 1963 between the United Kingdom, the Federation of Malaya, North Borneo (now Sabah), Sarawak and Singapore. Without the Malaysia Agreement, Malaysia would not exist.

Without the Malaysia Agreement, Sabah and Sarawak would not be part of Malaysia.

The Malaysia Agreement therefore stands as the most important document in the history of Malaysia. Unlike the Federal Constitution, it can NEVER be amended by anybody unless the territories that originally signed it decide once more to return to the negotiation room and determine a new future.

The Malaysia Agreement is also an agreement that has no time limit and not bound by any limitation. If the Malaysia Agreement had a time limit, then the territories which signed the Agreement will no longer be bound to one another upon expiry of that time limit. So, logically, the Malaysia Agreement stands timeless.

If this was an ordinary Agreement, breach of any of its clauses could be challenged. If it was an ordinary Agreement, it would have stipulated what must be done if there was a breach of the clauses. The Malaysia Agreement remains silent on the issue of breach.

This is deliberate. The Malaysia Agreement was drafted deliberately in its simplest form to allow the maximum loopholes and flexibility so that the territories which signed the Malaysia Agreement will have no unreasonable restrictions in determining their fates in the Federation of Malaysia. With top lawyers as signatories to the Malaysia Agreement, it would be inconceivable that the Agreement was drafted without careful thought and arrangement. Some of the signatories were educated and could have had access to the best legal advisers in the UK. The Malaysia Agreement therefore was calculated to be silent on some issues and loud on others.

When Singapore exited the Malaysia Agreement in 1965, there was much debate in parliament which is well recorded. No matter how much discussion went on there, they knew full well that nobody could challenge Singapore based on the Malaysia Agreement. Indeed they could not challenge Singapore based on any other legal document either. So it was all talk amongst Malaysian politicians with no impact on Singapore. Singapore went on to become the richest of the territories that entered into the Malaysia Agreement and Singapore was neither sued for their exit nor legally challenged. Lee Kuan Yew had one of the best legal minds in the East and he was no fool. If he wanted to continue leading Singapore, he knew he could not screw up his decision for Singapore in 1965. Nearly fifty years on, the guy is still standing tall with no regrets except his admission to me of “deep collateral guilt” for the people of North Borneo and Sarawak.

To understand the gravity of this situation therefore, all Malaysians must understand that the Malaysia Agreement was not a unilateral decision made by the Government of Malaya. Malaysia was formed because the British had to decide how best to dispose of their two colonies, Sabah and Sarawak.

Before they could form Malaysia and sign the Malaysia Agreement therefore the British proposed that a Commission of Enquiry be carried out in North Borneo and Sarawak in 1962 to determine how the people of the Borneo territories felt about the proposal.

The idea had already been discussed between the British and Malayan Governments in 1961 and on principle, Singapore and Malaya had by then agreed to merge and it was merely a question of seeking the views of the people of North Borneo and Sarawak and also the Sultan of Brunei, as to whether Brunei would also wish to join the new Malaysia.

Brunei, which was far smaller than the territories of Sabah and Sarawak, and yet in view of its proximity would have been subjected to the very same fears of communism at the time, somehow had a far better excuse not to enter into the Malaysia Agreement, which the British Government seemed to have fully respected.

The Malaysia Agreement was eventually signed after a Commission of Enquiry was carried out in North Borneo and Sarawak and two reports were presented to the British Government. These two reports were:-

1.    Report of the Commission of Enquiry, North Borneo and Sarawak 1962 (Cobbold Report)

2.    Report of the Inter-Governmental Committee 1962 (IGC Report)

The Commission of Enquiry

Appendix B of the Cobbold Report shows the Census Abstract for North Borneo and Sarawak in 1960.

In North Borneo, the population in 1960 was 454,421. They had 304 graduates, which was about 0.07% of their population.

In Sarawak, the population in 1960 was 744,529. They had 548 graduates, which was also about 0.07% of their population.

The Cobbold Commission sent out open invitations to the people of North Borneo and Sarawak to give their views both orally and in written form.

Of a combined total population of 1,198,950 people in North Borneo and Sarawak, the Cobbold Commission received 2,200 written letters and memoranda (0.183% of the population) and 4000 or so people appeared to give their views orally (0.334% of the population).

In 1962, the Cobbold Commission that heard HALF A PERCENT (0.5%) of the total population of North Borneo and Sarawak decided that this represented an affirmative decision to proceed with the signing of the Malaysia Agreement, even though a significant proportion of the 0.5% who bothered to respond to the Cobbold Commission had expressed reservations to the idea of forming Malaysia and requested more time.

With only 852 graduates in total, it is unclear how many of these graduates bothered to give their views. In any event, North Borneo and Sarawak did not have the intellectual capacity to form a pool of educated leaders to decide their political destiny in 1962.

Like schoolboys in a sandpit, a parody of ‘Lord of the Flies’ was inevitable as power struggles developed between people who were selected based on their popularity and political leanings rather than their intellectual prowess. For men who had only known subservience and wars, our forefathers were expected to develop democracy and political structures with civilisations that were centuries ahead of us. In 50 years, we are expected to develop the intellectual capacity of nations that began developing these political structures in the 16th century. Barely a hundred years ago, we were considered merely savages and uncivilised people.

It is no wonder to me that in 2013, we are still sweeping the mess under the carpets. The arrogance is more than evident, the greed glaring in the face of the nation and the vast majority of us, nearly all of us, stay silent, as we did in 1962, still somewhat savage and uncivilised in the way we attack each other politically.

The Cobbold Commission must therefore, posthumously, take full responsibility for a premature recommendation that has on hindsight led to more devastating consequences than could have possibly been predicted by even 0.07% of the population in 1962. We have lost all sense of harmony as documented in the Cobbold Report and we have become angry with each other, with foreigners, with our fingers pointing in all directions so that everybody has a part to play in the chaos and hatred. This is, by all accounts, tragic and devastating and, as a nation, we have lost our humanity. We no longer have faith in our system because we have stopped trusting anybody. We assume first and foremost that our neighbour has a bone to pick with us.

A small proportion of the population cares about the weak, the animals, the refugees and those who seek shelter in our country. A huge proportion of this population feel disenfranchised and cheated of their rights: their voting rights, their racial rights, their religious rights, their native rights, their territorial rights, their economic rights, their political rights, their freedom rights, their civil rights, their marching rights, their union rights, their welfare rights, their medical rights, their educational rights, and it goes on. They will get to the cause of this disenfranchisement and someone must take the blame: those who lead, those who benefit, those who are related, those who are more well-off, those who try to stop the chaos, those who are simply in the way of these arguments.

The rights can easily be negotiated within reasonable parameters but we still have savages who can never get it right.

We are simply, in the eyes of all developed civilisations, pathetic and ridiculous. By all accounts, it is still perhaps only 0.07% of the nation that can reasonably lead this country. Yet, the nation will stay silent, as they did in 1962. Our votes will never be enough to make a sizeable representation of what we feel as a nation and what we want as our future political destiny. We vote not by logic but by sentiments and so it is easy for us to be manipulated and fooled.

The security of Sabah and Sarawak

And so, in Borneo, we have no choice. To be known as the Borneo Kingmakers, to be the one who could hold the Federal Powers to reason and harness the security of our borders and immigration status, to be in a position to secure our 60 State seats and 25 Parliamentary seats in Sabah, to be in a position of phenomenal wealth and power so as to never have to bow and say yes to Malayan Federal orders, and more importantly to be able to hold Malaya to its Malaysia Agreement promises, the leaders at the helm of Sabah and Sarawak must be the type of leaders that common ordinary folk commonly describe as a dictator and a tyrant; men accused typically of rising to the top through corruption and raping of resources and holding the populace at bay with enough to keep them financially stable.
Such leaders would belong to 0.07% of the population of Sabah and Sarawak and they stand out as leaders who are charismatic enough to secure the forests and immense oil and gas reserves that are offshore and onshore the island of Borneo. We need these leaders to secure our rights in Borneo and ensure that every nominated Sabah and Sarawak minister at the State and Federal level will be taken seriously enough to hold immense portfolios and corporate positions so that the reality of Borneonisation is observed without having to say so.
They secured these realities through ways which we can never agree with and yet, there is no other way than to go through the coffers of our immense resources. They needed a form of silent mandate from the silent majority of people in Borneo to gather enough wealth to put them in a position of power that makes them more powerful than any other leader in the other 11 States of Malaysia. They know full well they can never secure the mandate of the public to reach the top and so they did what they felt they had to do before any other leader from the other 11 States got there first.

Any man or woman with the ambition of being powerful enough to sit on the same level playing field as the Prime Minister of Malaysia would have done exactly the same thing as such leaders in Sabah and Sarawak without a shred of remorse. We are too small to be significant and so we simply cannot afford to be sentimental and idealistic. We have to be ruthless, bold and follow the path of fierce logic to achieve our part of the bargain in 1963 when we signed the Malaysia Agreement.

Neither you nor I, if we qualified as 0.07% of the brains of Borneo, would have done it differently. It comes to mind therefore that even if I were ever given the mandate to lead Sabah as the Chief Minister, I would have probably followed in exactly the same footsteps as Musa Aman and Harris Salleh before him, with one exception. I would have amalgamated with Taib Mahmud and ensured the victory of whichever coalition we wish to negotiate with in West Malaysia but I would not allow Taib to take Sabah for a ride. It does not matter who the next Prime Minister of Malaysia is because at this point, by whatever means they took to achieve it, both Musa and Taib are the only two leaders in Sabah and Sarawak who would have the tenacity, the money and the balls to stand to the end like Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein and Robert Mugabe: big guys in small places who wrapped big guys in big places around their little fingers, while the rest of the world complains.

·         Note: Nilakrisna James is a lawyer, writer and activist who co-founded the apolitical NGO, United Borneo Front, in 2010 with politician, Datuk Dr. Jeffrey Kitingan. They parted ways at the end of 2011 when Dr. Jeffrey assumed the Chairmanship of STAR as an oppositional leader independent of any Federal led coalition. Nilakrisna remains a member of UPKO, a native component party of the ruling Barisan National alliance.

Link to original post: http://borneoinsider.com/2013/02/14/the-kingmakers-of-borneo/

Honouring the UN Treaty, 1963 Manila Accord, is the only way forward to solve the Sabah question

ON 31st JULY 2013 IS THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MANILA ACCORD*

THE ONLY LEGAL SOLUTION TO THE SABAH QUESTION IS TO HONOUR THE MANILA ACCORD. How? By pressuring Kuala Lumpur to negotiate with the Philippines. However, there is no way in hell that it can happen if President Aquino has put it in his head not to face the question head on or even just to raise - with a gentle whisper - the Manila Accord with his great friend in Kuala Lumpur, the not-so-smart (but one who has outsmarted our benighted leader Noynoy at every turn), the one and only corrupt, the greedy Bumiputra Affirmative Action-BN leader, ta da da... Najib Razak, the son of the man who initiated the troubles in Mindanao and caused the Philippines to lose many of its sons and daughters in what was then called the Mindanao Secession Wars...

Most of the 20 million Malayans are not that smart, in fact, they are rather stupid, are terribly bone idle, but one wonders how on earth they manage to outwit and outsmart 100 million Filipinos, many of whom boast of a certain degree of sophistication be it in education or in general culture!

The other solution is for Sabah to withdraw from the UK-engineered Malaysia Federation. There seems to be a trend towards that today but will all of Sabah agree? Not sure - Sabahans are just like Filipinos, they are easily conned by nice words, by good bribes and fight each other most of the time. They are rather laid back (understatement) so will take a bit of push from somewhere.

The ultimate solution, one might say, is war. But according to our benighted leader, that's out of the question and we agree with him. We not only do not have the material capability to go to war with Kuala Lumpur, it is also almost a certainty that most of our people will be anti such move. We have seen how PH reacted to the 'excursion' headed by SJKIII's brother - many of our politicians and their supporters almost peed in their pants when the Lahad Datu stand off happened... So let's say, that war is not an option.

If only we didn't have the Kiram 'intramurals' (the bickering, the infighting, the 'faking' - usurping of sultan title, etc, etc.,) perhaps, things would be slightly different. The saying that "united we stand divided we fall' is, as always, true.

NB: *Section 12 of the Manila Accord - UN TREATY 8029, signed by three heads of states before the creation of the Malaysia Federation namely, Suharto of Indonesia, Rahman of Malaya and Macapagal of the Philippines, stipulates the following:

12. The Philippines made it clear that its position on the inclusion of North Borneo in the Federation of Malaysia is subject to the final outcome of the Philippine claim to North Borneo. The Ministers took note of the Philippine claim and the right of the Philippines to continue to pursue it in accordance with international law and the principle of the pacific settlement of disputes. They agreed that the inclusion of North Borneo in the Federation of Malaysia would not prejudice either the claim or any right thereunder. Moreover, in the context of their close association, the three countries agreed to exert their best endeavours to bring the claim to a just and expeditious solution by peaceful means, such as negotiation, conciliation, arbitration, or judicial settlement as well as other peaceful means of the parties' own choice, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations and the Bandung Declaration.

Related blog post: Signing of the Manila Accord of 1963

Other links:

• Post colonial history: British North Borneo/Sabah and the 1963 Manila Accord
• UN Treaties