A 42-year-old pregnant woman presents with strong contraction pains at 3am. Of Filipino descent and speaking no Bahasa Malaysia, she was unable to provide any valuable clinical history pertinent to her current pregnancy.

In addition, she had not sought antenatal care. Multiparous, with 12 other children, she gave birth uneventfully but her premature 31-week baby developed breathing complications from his immature lungs.

He was referred to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in Likas, where he was treated for the next 48 days with costly first-line medications and neonatal supplements. Further investigations revealed congenital syphilis contracted from his mother.

Unable to settle the five-figure hospital bill, the father paid a meagre RM10, vowing to settle the outstanding amount on their next clinic visit. Seen a month later, the couple returned with their child and - brand new Malaysian identity cards (ICs).

Declaring themselves now to be Malaysian Bajaus, they were absolved of all their hospital debts and spirited onto the red carpet of bumiputera-ship.

A neglected child

A frail 3-year-old Indonesian boy was admitted for severe dehydration from a two-week history of infective diarrhoea. The second youngest of 14 children, he lives with his family in a 5 x 8m stilt house built over sea water, aptly known as kampung air . They draw water and electricity from illegal connections to the homes of Sabahans. Domestic waste and human excrement are disposed of by dumping into the sea or in drop latrines.

On examination, the child was drowsy in hypotensive shock and was severely malnourished. Over four weeks, he was given intensive care and nursed back to health with adequate rehydration and total parenteral nutrition costing RM1,000 per day.

When he was discharged, the parents swore themselves to be Bajau, flashed their newly-minted Mykad and laid claim to the privilege of free healthcare. From pendatang tanpa izin just a month ago, they've become warganegara Islam and are therefore eligible to the broad spectrum of bumiputera privileges under Umno's New Economic Policy.

The child went back home, where he nonchalantly resumed his daily routine of waddling barefooted in the filthy mud of a kampung air littered with human excrement.

A jobless lad

An unemployed 28-year-old man was admitted following a freak road accident. After a heavy alcohol binge, he had gone on a terror joyride with a friend equally under the influence. He suffered Grade 3 open fractures of both his right forearm bones with multiple tendon and nerve cuts. He underwent a complicated and costly emergency surgery, the first of many to come.

Over the next two months, he underwent repeated reconstructive procedures - readjustments of metal fixator, wound debridements and skin flaps. A week after discharge, he professed to be a Bajau. His outstanding hospital bills were consequently declared null and void.

A promiscuous husband

A 56-year-old man from Pulau Gaya presented with high fever associated with severe headache and was found to be jaundiced. He has three wives and 16 children, none of whom are schooling. After he admitted a long habit of extra-marital sexual activities, further diagnostic work-up confirmed HIV, Hepatitis C, and syphilis. A series of scans was required to exclude HIV-related cerebral toxoplasmosis and liver cirrhosis from chronic hepatitis C.

A fisherman by profession, he was unable to pay for the scans. He pleaded for three days after which his wives presented at the hospital with a Mykad fresh from the stoves of the National Registration Department (NRD). Yes, here in Umno's Sabah, everyone can be a Bumiputera Bajau - the Indonesians, Filipinos and Pakistanis too.

Insatiable greed

It is becoming increasingly incredulous to believe that the Barisan Nasional (BN) government has any genuine intention to root out the cancer of illegal immigration in Sabah.

While Singapore, Australia and the United Kingdom are harvesting the skill, talent and services of the truly cemerlang, gemilang and terbilang of Malaysian origin, Umno's Tanah Melayu is inflicting itself with infectious diseases and serious crimes with the most uneducated, unskilled and un-immunised imports from the Philipines and Indonesia.

Far from the lame excuses given by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, the crux of the issue is not an unmanageable coastline, but an insatiable greed for power and wealth among BN politicians.

Corruption has reached its highest degree in the state of Sabah. Here, citizenship has become a priceless commodity that can be bought and sold at the whims and fancies of Umno. Even as the Kadazandusun Murut population remains trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty and illiteracy, Filipinos, Indonesians and even Pakistanis are masquerading as Bajaus, purchasing Malaysian ICs and a lifetime of bumiputera privileges for a paltry sum of RM100.

These overnight bumiputeras have already overtaken the locals in sheer number and brute strength in Lahad Datu, Kota Belud, Semporna, Likas, Sandakan and Tawau. Pulau Gaya is virtually a mini-Philippines in Malaysian waters. Its notoriety for violence is such that even the armed forces fear to tread there.

While Sabah's socio-demography has undergone a politically-manoeuvered radical transformation, the true folly of BN's 'Project IC' is only beginning to show.

Corruption kills, literally

Already, Sabah is infamous for being the state most endemic with tuberculosis, no thanks to these non-immunised illegals. Last year, Sabah clinched the unenviable title as the state with the highest number of newly-diagnosed HIV cases. The overwhelming prevalence of highly infectious diseases among illegal immigrants is consuming our limited human and financial resources. Sexually transmitted diseases like HIV, syphilis, hepatitis B, C and gonorrhea are now spreading like wild fire.

So are infective diarrhoea and other environmental illnesses, due to 'Project IC' citizens utilising our rivers and seas like a gargantuan natural sewage tank. The battle against vector-borne infections like dengue and malaria is virtually lost.

While health inspectors impose fines and summonses on local citizens for harbouring pockets of potential Aedes breeding sites, the unhygienic and wholly-filthy settlements of Umno's prized immigrants are conveniently overlooked. The whole effort of vector control is but an exercise in vanity and exhibitionism.

In the name of so-called humanity to these supposed under-privileged people, the health ministry has vicariously deprived our own citizens of services for which they have paid taxes.

Foreigners form at least 30-50 percent of patients in government hospitals and clinics, stretching our health resources so thin that Malaysians have to contend with sub-optimal care. In hospitals, it is not uncommon for local citizens to be dumped on the floor while their 'Project IC' counterparts occupy proper beds. It is also not infrequent for illegal immigrants to receive intensive care and ventilator support at the expense of equally ill Malaysians who could have otherwise been saved with the proper facilities.

As cheap Filipino cigarettes and unpurified alcohol become easily available especially to our young children, Sabah can expect an epidemic of respiratory diseases and alcohol-related illnesses in the near future - if not already. Clinicians are already witnessing lung cancer and alcoholic liver disease among Sabahans at an age as young as 24 years.

The whole set-up makes no sense. It seems as though there is a concentrated effort to appease this particular group of people. Is humanity really the reason behind the health ministry's peculiar and unconditional generosity to illegal immigrants or is there a politically-savvy ulterior motive?

As the Malay proverb goes, kera di hutan disusukan, anak di rumah mati kelaparan (a saying reflecting misplaced priorities).

Tickling social time-bomb

The street kids of Kota Kinabalu are already a notorious entity - unkempt kids who should be studying spend their days peddling cigarettes and alcoholic brew or roaming about begging for cash in eateries and places of interest.

In recent years, their numbers have taken an exponential rise. The social consequences will be damning when these street children grow up to become unemployed and unemployable young men. Rape, murder, home break-ins and petty thefts are already a daily affair, in tandem with the increasing number of foreigners. While money and assets lost can be re-earned, the lives and dignity of those affected by murder and rape are difficult to restore.

The press provides a daily painful reminder. The Daily Express dedicates a whole page to crime, much of it allegedly involving foreigners. The flea markets tell a great detail of their side activities, brazenly selling stolen items ranging from shoes and t-shirts to handphones and laptops.

Many a family has been torn apart in more subtle ways. Young, unschooled foreign girls form the bulk of commercial sex workers throughout Sabah. Once blissful families are destroyed by the husbands' extramarital affairs with literally cheap foreign girls, many of them barely past teenage. A pregnant mother of five was recently found to have contracted HIV/Aids from her husband's chronic infidelity with Filipino guest relations officers in the many karaokes.

Far from even attempting to control the entry and proliferation of foreigners in Sabah, the Umno-controlled state and federal government are in effect vigorously wooing these people.

The Immigration Department gladly issues and renews work permits without any proper check on the person's background and current health. As a result, even someone with active pulmonary tuberculosis can resume working and spreading their Mycobacterium in Sabah.

The NRD freely issues birth certificates to any foreigner born in Sabah, a first big step before full bumiputera-ship in later life. Mysteriously, such documents are issued only to Muslim foreigners. The predominantly Catholic East Timorese and occasional Catholic Filipino are somehow denied such documents.

The Health Department makes Sabah even more homely to foreigners by offering virtually free healthcare. Chemotherapy, total parenteral nutrition, CT/MRI scans and major surgeries are all provided without any obligation for the cost to be settled. In other words, foreigners receive equal access to healthcare like any bona fide citizen.

BN's actual stand in the issue of illegal immigration is fully revealed during election campaigns. Sabahans find themselves sidelined as foreigners who do not speak a word of Bahasa Malaysia suddenly possess voting privileges. Such allegations fly during each election season but needless to say, are not investigated by the Election Commission.

The state Land Office panders to Umno's aspirations. Much land has been taken from the locals and allocated to 'Project IC' citizens. The distressed voices of the needy and lowly locals will probably never be heard, as their own Kadazandusun Murut leaders cave in to the love of money.

'Reverse-takeover'

This article in no way implies that all immigrants are partakers of hooliganism. As with every issue in life, there are two sides to a coin and no blanket statement can ever be justified.

Nevertheless, the daily experiences of the man-on-the-street do not lie. The threat and menace of foreigners in Sabah and Malaysia in general can never be understated and downplayed.

In Sabah particularly, the feared 'reverse-takeover' has begun, with the BN firmly seated in the director's chair.

Charity as they say, begins at home. The BN government can show more generosity and charity to locals in areas of hardcore poverty like Kota Marudu and Ranau, instead of quietly strengthening and empowering 'Project IC' beneficiaries.

With a muted media and a money-pacified Parti Bersatu Sabah, Umno will inexorably remain as the supreme master of Sabah for quite some time to come. Backed by a steady supply of loyal, overnight Muslim bumiputeras who potentially double as useful Mat Rempit when the need arises, the peace-loving local population is increasingly hapless.

The biggest losers are none other than local non-Muslim population which stands in Umno's way of establishing an Islamic state.

There will come a day where the Sabah we know will cease to exist. That is the day when a MALPHILINDO version comes into existence. That, I believe, will be a dream come true for Umno.

Selamat Hari Merdeka , fellow genuine citizens. Selamat Hari Malaysia , too.

PRODUCT OF THE SYSTEM is the pseudonym of a doctor in government service.