SABAH has been the second home for thousands of Filipinos who fled the southern Philippines following unrest there in the 1970s.

Some 55,000 of them are IMM13 holders – refugee cards issued by Malaysia which allow them to work and continue their trade in Sabah.

Over the years, they have taken over jobs in the construction and agriculture sectors and in coffee shops, prompting locals and politicians to continue to question their presence and need in Sabah.

The authorities, too, have been busy deporting these migrants but they keep coming back.

The Malaysian Insight spoke to migrants to find out why they are not keen to return to their homeland despite the hardship they face in Sabah.

It has never occurred to Norma Jalin, 32, to return to her birthplace in Tawi-Tawi, southern Philippines, since arriving in Sabah at the age of five.

The coffee-shop worker arrived in Sabah with her parents and older brother Amin about 27 years ago after her father was unable to find work back home.

“It was an uncle who insisted that we come to Sabah and work with him as a brick-layer at a construction site in Kota Kinabalu,” she told The Malaysian Insight.

It was a long and tiring journey, she said, remembering the boat travel from Tawi-Tawi to Sandakan and, thereafter, a few hours’ drive to Kota Kinabalu and a 10-minute drive to a water village in Pulau Gaya, a safe haven for hundreds of illegal immigrants then.

“While father worked in a construction site, my mother had to secure a job at an Indian-Muslim restaurant,” said Norma, the same restaurant where she works now.

She started working at the restaurant at 16 after her father obtained the IMM13 document, which allowed them to earn a living in the state.  

Norma started from waiting tables and later trained to make drinks at the restaurant where she earns around RM900 a month, below the minimum wage cap set for Sabah and Sarawak.

“I would go back to Tawi-Tawi only if I can open a business there. It is hard to make a living in the Philippines. It is better here,” she said.

For Ahmad Jamal, 42, who is originally from Marawi, life started for the second time in Sabah after being released from the Kapayan prison for manslaughter in 2017.

Released in early 2017, he is now hired by a sub-contractor at a construction site near Putatan, a town about 10 minutes from Kota Kinabalu.

Earning as little as RM35 a day, Ahmad said he misses home in the Philippines as his wife and children are there.

“But at this present financial condition, it is tough for me to go home. The best I can do is to begin sending money home again,” said Ahmad, adding that he last saw his wife about two years ago during the siege of Marawi.

The five-month armed conflict in Marawi, Lanao Del Sur, started in May 2017, between Philippines security forces and armed militants linked to the Islamic State, including the Maute and Abu Sayyaf groups.

Ahmad lives on Pulau Gaya and takes a boat daily to Putatan where he works.

He said he had been evading the authorities by escaping from one water village to another from Pulau Gaya to Tanjung Aru, Sepanggar, Likas or Petagas.  

He is unable to apply for IMM13 as the Immigration Department ceased issuing these papers in 2013.

Since 1990 to August last year, Immigration has deported more than 570,000 migrants in Sabah.

So far this year, more than 500 operations have been conducted, with more than 3,000 migrants picked up for investigations and deportation, said the state Immigration. – August 11, 2019.