Malaysia is a federation, not a country. The federal constitution in Article 1(1) states that, " The Federation shall be known, in Malay and in English, by the name Malaysia.". It doesn't say Malaysia is a country.

Malaysia was a federation created by four countries. The federation of Malaysia was created by Singapore Sabah and Sarawak with Malaya on 16 September 1963 by Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63) entered into on 9 July 1963.

Therefore, Sabah and Sarawak should still maintain their status as countries and not as states or as regions. At the same time, the federal constitution does not say Sabah and Sarawak are regions within the federation of Malaysia.

At the moment Sarawak and Sabah are states in the federation of Malaysia. Now the Sarawak government may wish to call Sarawak a region and not a state in Malaysia.

Being a federation, Malaysia is not a country although there is a federal government for the federation.

Singapore left or exited from the federation of Malaysia in 1965 and declared independence. The fact that Singapore after leaving or exiting from the federation of Malaysia declared independence, shows that Singapore Sabah and Sarawak were acquired to enlarge Malaya and to become colonies of Malaya. Malaya then after having acquired Singapore Sabah and Sarawak to enlarge her territories, then changed her name to Malaysia.

Therefore, it is difficult to convince Sabah and Sarawak are not colonies of Malaya. Since it is a political rule that colonial masters are allowed to take all natural resources of colonized countries, Sabah and Sarawak then lost their oil and gas resources under the Petroleum Development Act 1974(PDA74) and have these resources pumped by PETRONAS, causing Sabah and Sarawak losing about two hundred billion ringgit each year of these natural wealth. In return, Sabah and Sarawak normally get about ten billion ringgit back annually as development fund in annual budget from the federal parliament.

The central government is the central government of Malaya because the federal government is controlled by Malaya.

Therefore for the change of status from state to region is pure vanity as it will just be a political announcement to please people only but will have no legal implication. The correct thing for the Sarawak government to do is to get the federal government to amend the federal constitution to restore Sarawak as a country within the federation of Malaysia.

Voon Lee Shan
President
Parti Bumi Kenyalang
5 May 2024