KUCHING: Growing coordination among Sabah and Sarawak lawmakers reflects a constitutional reality rather than opportunistic politics, said Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) secretary-general Datuk Sebastian Ting
(pic) in response to recent remarks by lawyer and former minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim.
Ting told
Dayak Daily that criticism of the so-called Borneo Bloc showed what he described as a misunderstanding of Malaysia’s constitutional structure and the historical foundations of the federation.
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He said cooperation among MP from Sabah and Sarawak to advance common interests should be viewed within the framework of federal representation.
“When MP from Sabah and Sarawak cooperate to advance common interests, it is suddenly portrayed as opportunistic politics,” he said, adding that “such criticism misses the point entirely.”
He said Malaysia was not created through the expansion of the Federation of Malaya but through the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63), under which Sabah, Sarawak, Singapore and Malaya agreed to form a new federation.
“Under this agreement, Sabah and Sarawak did not join Malaysia as subordinate states,” he said, adding that “they entered as founding partners in a new constitutional agreement.”
Ting said the so-called Borneo Bloc was not a political invention but “a natural and legitimate expression of federal representation,” adding that growing coordination among lawmakers from Sabah and Sarawak reflected what he described as a long overdue recognition of constitutional realities.
