FOREIGNERS NOW CONSTITUTE ABOUT ONE-THIRD OF THE SABAH POPULATION ?

Illegal immigrants problem not under 10MP irks SAPP

KOTA KINABALU: The Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) has lamented that the 10th Malaysia Plan has excluded illegal immigration and other pressing issues that have troubled Sabah for a long time now.

Its secretary-general Datuk Richard Yong said it was estimated that foreigners now constitute about one-third of the state’s population. He said it was not difficult to imagine the burden Sabah and the local population have to shoulder in terms of socio-economic, security and political risks.

“The matter is so serious and yet it has slipped the attention of planners of the 10MP. SAPP urges the federal government to look into this issue seriously and come up with short and long-term solutions,” Richard said yesterday.

Richard also described the government’s plans to build 78,000 houses for the homeless “like a never ending story which repeated itself every five years. In comparison, under the 10MP, the government intends to build 6,312km of paved roads in Peninsular Malaysia which is already very much developed in terms of road network, but will build only 2,540km of roads in Sabah which is about 40 per cent the size of the peninsula and far lacking in basic infrastructure.

“The construction of 2,540km of roads for Sabah might sound impressive, but the progress of the long overdue airport project, overhead bridges, and the infamous railway project are in the slow lane.”

He also doubted the government’s capability to ease the rate of poverty in Sabah from the present 22.8 per cent to 12 per cent in just five years.

“Even then compared to the rest of the country, Sabah will remain the number one poorest state in Malaysia. The reasons that had turned Sabah, once one of the richest states now into the poorest state is more than just poor basic infrastructure,” said Richard, who also criticised the government’s childhood development programme.