COMMENT The issues of state rights and autonomy have always been an intense subject of public discussion in Sabah. Sabah leaders claim that Sabah has lost its autonomy and it is time for its autonomy to be fully reinstated - including an increase in oil royalty from the meagre five percent to 20 percent.

While no one can deny the fact that Sabah deserves the right to assert its autonomy based on the Malaysian Agreement of 1963, it has to be done within the context of the Federation of Malaysia and the interest of the country as a whole.

Sabah leaders appear to lack the vision on how they aim to translate this call for autonomy into pragmatic policies that can benefit the ordinary people...