SANDAKAN: The Federal government stands accused of practicing a divide and rule policy and as a result depriving Sabahans of the development and progress enjoyed by their counterparts elsewhere in Malaysia.
Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) president Yong Teck Lee said over the weekend that this divide and rule policy is prevalent even 47 years after the formation of Malaysia on Sept 16, 1963.
"Even today, we still have federal leaders saying that this month of August is the country's 53rd Merdeka Day celebrations.
"It is their mentality and mindset that Sabah and Sarawak just joined in the Federation of Malaya.
“We are treated as 'son' and the Federal government as the 'father', resulting in the unfair treatment from Kuala Lumpur," said Yong when opening the SAPP Tanjang Papat and Elopura service centres at Bandar Kim Fung here on Sunday.
He said Sabahans deserved better from the central government with more equitable distributions of opportunities and development projects but were instead getting a lot of chatter by the various parties of ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition and pledges were not matched by action.
"The federal government had failed to honour the Malaysia Agreement signed on July 9, 1963, whereby we still have few Sabahans holding positions in federal departments and agencies."
"We have plenty of gas, petroleum, palm oil and other natural resources, but why are we still poor? Where were the promises pledged 47 years ago? We were promised that we would prosper like Malaya, but we have become the poorest state in the country," Yong pointed out.
He said the lop-sided relations between the state and federal governments had contributed to snowballing issues such as the presence of huge number of illegal immigrants and the shortage of power supply in the state.
Also accelerating is the rate of unemployment in the state, causing many Sabahans to look for jobs elsewhere and resulting in many of them being stranded and begging for food in Kuala Lumpur.
Yong said only a change of government would give the people of Sabah a second chance to make good on what had been promised.
He urged voters to help bring about this change during the forthcoming 13th general election.
3 comments:
whether the Sabahan is ready to change the current government or not. let's wait and see what is going to be surprises in the next general election.
hope sabahahn can change and more develops.
Yup if we said that we will make the changes but in the end, we know not to each others vote.. it is still remain as secret!
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