SABAH Chief Minister Shafie Apdal has rubbished claims the state government is issuing illegal immigrants citizenship papers.  

He said the government was trying to help Sabahans who were married to foreigners and their children who were born here.

“We are trying to help our own. There are Sabah men and women married to foreigners and they could be abandoned, along with their children (by their spouses). 

“So we need to help them resolve the problem. We refer all of these to the registration department (NRD). 

“The government doesn’t give out identity cards – that’s rubbish. But the children are Sabahans and they have rights,” he said, after a meet-and-greet session with the people in Semporna, in Sabah’s east coast.

A recent survey by a coalition of Sabah welfare groups revealed there were about 60,000 stateless persons in the state, most of which were in the east coast.

Shafie had in June said the government was considering special work passes for illegal immigrants, but opposition leaders had accused the Warisan-led state government of giving out MyKads to illegals.

Meanwhile, Shafie refuted allegations that recent fires in squatter villages where the migrants dwelled were the work of migrants who wanted identity cards and housing aid from the state government. 

“No one would wish for a fire. Instead, I should be worried when people lose their homes because they will come to me to ask for housing. 

“But it could be true the squatters had lost their MyKads in the fires but there are also illegal migrants there. But this does not mean Mykads would be given to the illegal migrants if they lost their homes,” he said. 

Earlier, Shafie noted more than 90% of Sabah’s problems were related to land, followed by statelessness and lack of infrastructure such as roads and bridges.

He said the meet-and-greet programme allowed him to hear first-hand the problems faced by everyday Sabahans. 

“The complaints I heard were largely on land-related matters like overlapping claims, land grabs by individuals and big companies. 

“The programme will be extended to the other districts soon. 

“Although the capacity of the government is limited, we will try our best to help them, to at least reduce whatever burden they may have,” he said. 

More than 5,000 Semporna constituents attended the event and filled out complaint forms. 

The forms are screened and then forwarded to the related state or federal departments to take action. 

“I know there are many in the remote areas whose problems have not been heard. They are unable to travel for hours to submit their complaints at the Rural Transformation Centres. 

“We need to reach out to them; we can’t be building more of the centres, which are costly to maintain.

“If they can’t come to us, we will go to them.” – August 23, 2018.