KOTA KINABALU: Attorney General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail yesterday said the “Twenty Points” and the “Eighteen Points” agreements had expressly stated that: “There should be no right to secede from the Federation.”
Abdul Gani who disclosed this when touching on calls for the secession of Sabah and Sarawak during his speech at the opening of Legal Year 2015 for Sabah and Sarawak at the High Court here, also said it was an agreed position taken by the people of Sabah and Sarawak themselves when these two states agreed to the formation of Malaysia.
“It cannot now be for a disgruntled minority to unilaterally change it,” he further said.
Abdul Gani said as he had stressed on other occasions, if there was consensus for change, let it be done by the people affected.
“More importantly, let it be done through an agreed constitutional mechanism without infringing parliamentary democracy.
“But if the issue is really about how the constitutional safeguards for Sabah and Sarawak are being implemented, than the arguments and debate should be focused accordingly and discourse carried out rationally,” he added.
He explained that the secession of Sabah and Sarawak from the Federation of Malaysia goes against the spirit of federalization and arguably, seditious.
Abdul Gani said the “social contract” with Sabah was based on the safeguards mooted in the Twenty Points Agreement while that with Sarawak was based on the Eighteen Points Agreement.
“The memoranda containing these safeguard conditions were considered by the Inter-Governmental Commission set up on the recommendation of the Cobbold Commission in 1962,” Abdul Gani explained.
He also said the safeguard conditions, with some modifications, were included into the Malaysia Act, the Federal Constitution and the state constitutions of Sabah and Sarawak.
“These are historical facts and they are recorded for posterity in the relevant reports of these Commissions. They should be read, appreciated and properly understood by every succeeding generation of Malaysia,” he added.