By : IDA LIM
KUALA LUMPUR : The award of
'overnight citizenship' to Sabah's illegal immigrants may cost the Najib
administration dearly at the ballot box if it is not resolved before the 13th
general elections, a federal minister has told Singapore's Sunday Times (ST).
Sabahans have become more
unhappy at the federal government's seemingly speedy approval of citizenship to
Muslim immigrants, many who are believed to enter the country illegally, seeing
the newcomers as a threat, Tan Sri Bernard Dompok told the Singapore paper in
an interview published today.
"It's unprecedented.
Generally, Sabahans have no problem with migrants, provided they come through
the front door, and if they want to apply for citizenship, do it in the proper
manner.'They can't expect to get citizenship overnight. There must be value to
citizenship," he was quoted as saying.
He urged the federal
government to take swift action on Sabah's illegal immigration issue before the
next national polls, which must be called by next April.
Dompok told the Singapore
paper the citizenship award for illegal immigrants has become an emotional
issue for the state's voters.
The thorny issue has caused
much concern, with Sabah politicians from the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN)
coalition pushing for a Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI), while the federal
government appeared to have dragged its feet in resolving the matter.
Dompok told ST that many in
Sabah think the "integrity of the system has been compromised".
"My party has made
known our stand. My head is on the chopping board as far as this issue is
concerned," said the president of United Pasokmomogun Kadazandusun Murut
Organisation (Upko), a BN component party in Sabah.
According to The Sunday
Times, Upko has pressed for investigations on fears that citizenship is granted
to Muslim immigrants "overnight" if they agree to vote for BN.
Dompok had reportedly said
last year that the size of the non-Muslim natives and Muslim Bumiputeras were
about equal in 1960, but noted that the latter group had doubled in 2000 and
was now nearly twice the population of non-Muslim native Sabahans.
Sabah has experienced a
population explosion over the years. Lawmakers in Parliament were told last
year that the state population, which numbered just over 650,000 in 1970 grew
to more than 920,000 in 1980.
Within the next two decades,
the state grew by 1.5 million people to reach over 2.4 million in 2000.
Media reports noted that
Sabah's population reached 3.12 million in 2010, with foreigners accounting for
a substantial 27 per cent of that figure.
The Singapore paper reported
that Sabah's population is now one-third larger than neighbouring Sarawak,
Malaysia's largest state by area size.
Although Sabah is
traditionally viewed as a safe vote bank for BN, failure by the ruling
government to address this issue may cost it crucial votes that will enable it
to stay on in power.
Urban voters in Sabah had
expressed their desire for an RCI on the immigrants issue in a survey carried
out by independent pollster Merdeka Centre last May.
Last month, the federal
government told Parliament that it was in the final stages of drawing up the
RCI's terms of references but there does not seem to have been any further news
of the promised RCI since then. (TMI)
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