Former Sabah chief minister Harris Mohd Salleh has criticised Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) for continuously taking the government to task over the alleged issuance of identity cards to hundreds of thousands of people in the state based on false surat akuan (statutory declaration).

He said by questioning this, the Kadazandusun-based party led by another former chief minister Joseph Pairin Kitingan, was also questioning the government over the validity of many people in the interior of Sabah who obtained their ICs using surat akuan.

Harris' reference to 'people in the interior of Sabah' is usually taken to mean the largely Christian Kadazandusun-Muruts who, along with the Chinese and others, supported PBS in 1985 to oust the Harris-led Berjaya state government after nine years in office.

That had left Harris - who took over as chief minister in 1976 from the late Tun Fuad Stephens - and Pairin bitter political foes up to this day.

Not fair

In his capacity as Yaysan Islam Sabah (YIS) president, Harris said in a statement that it was not fair for PBS to make what he described as 'baseless allegations' against the federal government.

He called on the federal government to come out and clarify the issue once and for all.

Pairin, who is Sabah deputy chief minister and rural development minister, said on Thursday that the issue had become a main agenda of the government at the state and federal levels.

He welcomed the setting up of the federal cabinet committee announced by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak to look into the matter and deputy police chief Musa Hassan's statement that a probe will be launched.

Several NGOs, including the Consumer Association of Sabah and Labuan FT (Cash), have called on the government to revoke the genuine ICs allegedly issued to foreigners, mostly from the Philippines and Indonesia, over the past three decades or more.

PBS supreme council member and ex-senator Dr Chong Eng Leong went before the parliamentary select committee on integrity in Kota Kinabalu last month, alleging that among the estimated 1.8 million foreigners in Sabah, many had obtained ICs and become citizens 'through dubious means' under a secret plan called 'Project M'.

'Avoiding the real issue'

When addressing a PBS division annual general meeting last week, Pairin said the opposition was trying to win over the rakyat by claiming that Barisan Nasional (BN) elected representatives had failed or were reluctant to raise the issue in Parliament.

On the contrary, the PBS leader said the party's MPs and state assemblypersons had repeatedly raised the problem.

"PBS will continue to raise irregularities that involve illegals in Sabah such as 'phantom voters', falsification of ICs and possession of ICs through dubious means," he added.

However, Harris said the surat akuan had ended years of waiting for the majority of native Sabahans in the interior divisions as well as in rural areas for their ICs and birth certificates.

"During the early days, these people did not have original birth certificates and therefore the only document that they relied on as proof that they were born in Sabah was their statutory declarations," he added.

Harris, who ruled Sabah for almost a decade until he was ousted by PBS, said the allegation from PBS leaders and others on this issue was 'very serious in a multi-racial country like Malaysia'.

Commenting on this, leading Sabah activist Patrick Sindu claimed that Harris was trying to avoid the real issue.

"By mentioning the interior people, Harris is deliberately trying to avoid the real issue. He is one of the culprits who colluded with (former prime minister) Dr Mahathir Mohamad in giving ICs to foreigners who had been in the country for only a couple of months," he alleged.

'The Kadazandusun-Muruts are the original indigenous people of Sabah and their ancestors have been in this country for a long time, even before Malaysia.

"Here, we are talking about genuine ICs issued to foreigners who arrived only yesterday, and the motives are all too clear," he added.

Sindu also heads the signature campaign to petition the King to set up a royal commission of inquiry into the problems created by the presence of foreigners in Sabah.