Shipping: Sabah beaten and betrayed

In the IGC Report it is very clear that even when something is a federal function, such an action cannot be carried out at the expense of Sabah and Sarawak.

Justice is absent when you became a convenience.

This is where Sabah is since it moved to form Malaysia in 1963.

Sabah is a convenience to Malaya (Peninsula) when it comes to seeking new sources of funds for Malaysia’s extravagant spending; or when the incumbent (Umno-Barisan Nasional) wants to continue clinging to political power.

Malaysians in Sabah should not be discriminated; this is the core concern outlined in the Cobbold Commission Report 1962, The Inter-Government Report 1962 and the safeguards provided for in the Malaysia Agreement 1963.

In the Inter-Governmental Committee Report, whose term of reference is to work out the Constitutional arrangements, it is very clear that even when something is a federal function, such an action cannot be carried out at the expense of Sabah and Sarawak.

Take shipping and navigation, for instance. The IGC reports in Annex A (9) page 21 states that:“(a)(i) Shipping and navigation on the high seas and in tidal and inland waters, other than shipping under fifteen registered ton is a federal function and this includes ports declared as Federal Ports.”

This means that undeclared Ports come under the state’s jurisdiction.

It is in this context that the IGC reports provide safeguards and caveats where it clearly states that: “The Federal Government will not interfere with the present policy which aims at administration of ports by port authorities.

“In respect of port fees and dues, discriminations should not be introduced, designed to divert shipping from current trade routes.

“This is subject to the over-riding requirements of defense.”

The governments of Sabah and Sarawak undertook that their legislation should provide that the foreshores are either alienated or State land.

As such even when shipping, navigation and ports are federal subject matters, the Federal Government cannot simply over-write the state government.

Conceit and betrayal

These safeguards and caveats as such can only be overriden by defense needs and not by the need to help the domestic shipping industries.

The Federal government is not allowed to interfere in port administration and it cannot discriminate by diverting the shipping from current trade routes.

For the record, in the 1960’s Sabah had direct access to international ports such as Hong Kong.

Now we have nothing.

The whole point of forming the Federation of Malaysia was to ensure that the interest of each individual component of the Federation is protected and safeguarded.

In the process of building a nation, compromises were made but the decision was always based on consensus and negotiations between the periphery and the center (Putrajaya).

Deviating from this doctrine of nation building means the Federation of Malaysia was built and now thrives on conceit and betrayal. - FMT Borneo Plus

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