NGO Lawyers for Liberty (LFL) has urged local Sabah politicians opposed to the Home Ministry's plan to issue birth certificates to stateless children in state on humanitarian grounds, not to be xenophobic or prejudicial to the community.

 

LFL executive director Eric Paulsen said the populist and alarmist stance of certain politicians carry serious repercussions on the human rights of the most vulnerable people in Sabah.

 

While acknowledging that the ancestors of these communities may have migrated to Sabah legally or illegally, many of their descendants were born and are living all their lives in the state.

 

"Many live in poverty and a life of exploitation, unable to access basic social services like healthcare and education but are also unfairly blamed and easily targeted by politicians for social ills and violent crimes in Sabah," he said in a statement today.

 

Paulsen said many of them have already lived there long enough to fulfill citizenship or permanent resident conditions and have the right not to be made stateless under international law.

 

Several Sabah politicians including State Reform Party chief Jeffrey Gapari Kitingan ( right ), Parti Bersatu Sabah chief Joseph Pairin Kitingan and PKR's Sabah lawmaker Darell Leiking, have opposed the plan, warning that it may be used as a pathway to citizenship.

Many in Sabah are still angry over a covert social engineering operation in the state in the 1980s and 1990s, where Muslim immigrants were illegally granted citizenship to alter the Christian-majority population in the state.

 

Consistent denial

The federal government had consistently denied its role in the operation but a Royal Commission of Inquiry on Immigrants in Sabah, which report is to be tabled in this Parliament sitting, was told that several top government officials had engineered the plan.

 

Paulsen said he noted that the concerns raised with regards to the latest birth certificate plan were legitimate but said it does not equal to the granting of citizenship.

 

"Let us be clear, birth registration only certifies birth, place of birth, parentage and is wholly different from the issue of citizenship. 

 

"All citizenship matters including grant of citizenship, identity documents and registration in the electoral roll, must be conducted properly and in accordance with established laws, regulations and practices, and not through corrupt practices, fraud or for improper political gains," he said.

 

Paulsen said that birth registration, without which children cannot be admitted into public schools in the country, is a fundamental right and international obligation under the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

 

"Lawyers for Liberty therefore calls for all parties to remain level-headed and not let prejudicial or xenophobic sentiments cloud their judgment as statelessness affecting children is especially serious, and it is high time steps are taken for these children to be recognised and protected by the state," he said.