We hope that YAB PM Tun Dr Mahathir will still ensure that the Cabinet Steering Committee will continue doing what it was established to do. So too, we hope that the Technical & Working Committtees under it will continue their tasks as scheduled.
Additionally, in the spirit of wanting to address the non-fulfilment of obligations of MA63 ( with IGC Recommendations annexed thereto) & the Federal Constitution, by any of the parties i.e. Federated Malay States, Sabah & Sarawak, all these years since forming Malaysia, we hope that there will be a Special Select Committee of Parliament formed, as suggested by the PM himself in his winding up speech last Tuesday, in order to enhance our common efforts in getting to amicable or workable closures of antecedent or outstanding issues. Similar suggestion to form a parliamentary select committee, was moved earlier by MP Santubong & MP Putra Jaya on behalf of GPS MPs as well as by Opposition Leader, Dato’ Sri Sabri Yakub and MP Tuaran. Most of the opposition MPs who spoke during the debate on the Bill, also ask Parliament to form a select committee with a view to have the reasonable inputs from all stakeholders.
It would be a real disappointment to all Malaysians particularly the people of Sabah & Sarawak if all the efforts to address the shortcomings in the implementation of MA63 is stalled or done in any lesser mode.
The Bill did not get the mandatory 2/3rd of total votes required simply because it lacks the necessary ingredients in terms of proper wordings and substance in order to really give the constitutional & legal meaning that places ‘equal-partner/party status’ to Sarawak as envisaged by MA63, the IGC Report & the Cobbold Commission Report.
The GPS MPs had fiercely contended that nothing in the the draft Bill was there anything to say that Sabah and Sarawak are “equal partners” and further MA63 were not referred to. The Bill could not be supported also because the interpretation of the word “ Federation” in Article 160 of the Federal Constitution as it is now, only refers to mean “the Federation pursuant to the Federation of Malaya Agreement 1957”, thus, confusingly leaving out Sabah & Sarawak and MA83 from the equation.
This anomaly or “error”’ in the interpretaion of the word “ Federation” has been there since 1963, tending us to believe that even the 1963 version of Article 1(2) were also not properly drafted to reflect the requirement of MA63. That lack of substance subsisted even when the same article was amended along with another 40 odds amendments to the Constitution, made in 1973.
Whether we like it or not, the Federal Constitution has to be looked at and reviewed in the light of MA63, holistically, once and for all. Due to the multifaceted nature in subject-matter covered by our Federal Constitution, amendments to the Constitution can be done by stages, depending on priorities and needs of the nation, but any exercise thereto must be done in such a way that the proposed amendment (s) must essentially be complete in form as well as substance in any particular regard or aspect, without leaving any legal ambiguity, hiatus, anomaly, vacuum or lacuna .
Our GPS MPs are wise enough to fathom what is right and what is not so right for Sarawak and its people. But more important than just being wise, they are very careful and conscious of how history will eventually judge them and they want to be judged by our present and future generations as very astutely responsible leaders of the people who keep tabs of the peoples’ pulses, and fight for their needs and aspiration. History will tell why they could not just swallow something which was raw or half-cooked and meaningless such as the Bill on Tuesday which was advanced by the PH Govt and viciously supported by some Sarawak PH MPs without much thoughts and care for the interest of Sarawak and its people.
Amazingly, some senior Sarawak PH MPs were noticeably quiet and seemingly mum during the debate session. Some asked why are they behaving differently on their side. The answer is that, there is a clear distinction between GPS MPs and their PH counterparts. GPS MPs had to make sure that in whatever they do it must be “SARAWAK FIRST”! whilst it seems that those on the other side seemed to desparately want the Bill to be hurriedly passed as if their were really deep on a
“party-survival” kind of mode!
Dato’ Idris Buang
Information Chief
Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu
Sarawak
11 April 2019
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