IC cartels a thing of the past, Home Minister says of Sabah RCI
(Malay Mail Online) – Cartels selling identity cards in Sabah no longer exist, Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said today, after a Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) found that organised syndicates were responsible for the mass nationalisation of illegal immigrants in the state.
The Home Minister said the National Registration Department (NRD) has worked hard over the years to stamp out the menace, which he said was typically done by syndicates that worked with corrupt officials in the department.
“There may have been cartels in the past, but the NRD has carried out strict screening and proactive measures have been taken.
“There are no more organised cartels in Sabah or anywhere else in the country,” he said at a news conference here.
On Wednesday, Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Ali Hamsa revealed that the RCI on Sabah’s illegal immigrant problem was the work of illegal syndicates with ties to corrupt officials in government agencies.
The top civil servant said the syndicates were “motivated by economic gains” and were not politically motivated, despite earlier claims that the controversial “Projek IC” was a citizenship-for-votes initiative allegedly linked to former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed.
Ahmad Zahid today said the NRD will continue to clamp down on all involved in the illicit trade and purchase of Malaysian ICs, which includes rigorous scrutiny of suspicious records flagged by the authorities and deploying plain-clothed officers to monitor the situation on the ground.
The federal Cabinet has also recently agreed that only children born to Malaysian parents will be issued birth certificates while the offspring of foreign parents in the country will only be given a birth record, the minister added.
Ahmad Zahid noted that his ministry will continue with its outreach programme to help undocumented Malaysians secure their legal documents, and urged MPs and state assemblymen to help identify and bring together all who qualify so the authorities can speed up the process.
During the RCI’s proceedings, which started in January last year, testimonies from Filipinos and other immigrants revealed how they received their blue identification cards or the MyKad — which is proof of citizenship — in just a few years after arriving in Sabah and how they had also voted in elections.
The Commission headed by Tan Sri Steve Shim Lip Kiong, who is also former Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak, was set up on September 21, 2012.
It had called 211 witnesses including Dr Mahathir and opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim before closing the case on September 20 last year.
The commission’s long-awaited report was finally released today in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, six months after the royal panel presented its findings to the prime minister and the Yang di-Pertuan Agong in May. It is unclear what had caused the delay.
