KOTA KINABALU: Usno president Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia is no longer fighting for Sabah but for ‘Malaya’, says Sabah STAR president Datuk Seri Dr Jeffrey Kitingan.
He called out Pandikar Amin for his remarks in a podcast that Sabahans have only been looking at the Malaysia Agreement 1963 from a Sabah’s point of view and threatening the federal government unless state rights were fulfilled.
“Well, I don’t quite agree with the way he put things. I don’t think we have been looking at the MA63 from just our point of view,” said Kitingan in a press conference addressing these statements here, Sunday (Oct 26).
Jeffrey insisted that Sabah leaders speak up because the MA63 has yet to be fulfilled, while both Sabah and Sarawak continued to be negatively impacted by this failure.
Kitingan said that despite being in the federation of Malaysia for over 60 years, Sabah remains the poorest state while being the richest in natural resources.
“And this is just one area we are talking about – economics. But we can also talk about education, social issues …,” he said.
He questioned how Sabah leaders are supposed to keep quiet when oil rights and revenues were taken from Sabah, when they do not pay the 40% net revenue owed, when they do not implement the MA63, when they take state seats and when they grab our political powers.
“Is that what my friend (Pandikar Amin) is trying to say?” he asked, adding that Pandikar Amin seemed to imply that Sabah should stop making demands and just leave things be.
On Pandikar Amin’s statement that he did not follow Sabah STAR’s footsteps in going solo, Kitingan claimed that it was not because of his principles but because he does not see Sabah STAR as having financial resources.
Kitingan said just going where the money is continues to be a weakness of Sabah leaders until today.
“Now he seems to say there are no injustices and we should keep quiet. He is no longer fighting for Sabah, he is fighting for Malaya,” said Kitingan.
“So my friend, make up your mind and fight for justice for Sabah,” he said, also reiterating calls for the creation of a Sabah for Sabah government.
