KOTA KINABALU: Immigrants who have obtained Malaysian identity cards do not seem too concerned about the information stated in the documents.
“So long as it (the identification document) is issued by the relevant authorities to them it is valid even though the details are not accurate,” Royal Commission of Inquiry on the presence of illegal immigrant in Sabah chairman, Tan Sri Steve Shim Lip Kiong, said.
“The big question is, who is to blame?” Shim asked.
He made the remarks after two Indonesian witnesses giving evidence at the hearing yesterday were unable to tell conducting officer Jamil Ariffin personal information such as their places of birth as stated on their identity cards.
Both were born in Indonesia and had entered Sabah legally before applying for the Malaysian identity card. They were, however, unable to tell Jamil the places of birth stated on the identification documents.
Martyn Salenpang, under Jamil’s questioning, told the panel that he was from Toraja and came to Sabah in 1970 to seek his fortune.
In 1978, he was approached by a woman named Christine, who is also from Toraja, and the latter asked him if he wanted to get a Malaysian identity card to which he said ‘yes’.
Martyn said, he then went to see Abdullah, the Tawau Ketua Anak Negeri then, and was asked to fill in a form. He was then asked to pay RM15 for a statutory declaration, Martyn said, adding that he received his Malaysian identity card soon after that.
He also told the panel that he registered as a voter in 1981 and has been voting diligently since then.
In Maming Saleng’s case, he said that he came to Sabah from Sulawesi in 1981 legally and was employed in several logging camps in Sandakan before finally settling down in Telupid.
According to Maming, one day in 1983, he was approached by his camp manager, who asked if he wanted to apply for a Malaysian identity card.
“I knew at that time I was not qualified to be a Malaysian citizen but I just wanted to try my luck,” he said, adding that he dealt with two men who came to the camp where he was working and helped him to fill in the application form.
Maming said that he paid them RM50 and another RM100 when he received the identity card from them two months later.
Maming has registered as a voter and voted ever since. He had also successfully applied for a Malaysian passport and used the document twice to go to Indonesia to visit his mother there.
Jamil asked both Martyn and Maming what they would do if their Malaysian citizenship was revoked and their identity card recalled, to which they replied that they would reapply to be Malaysians.
Meanwhile, fellow Indonesian, Ahmad Soso, who was born in Bone, Sulawesi and now residing in Ranau, corrected Jamil when he said that the Malaysian identity card Ahmad obtained was issued in a coffee shop.
“It is from the National Registration Department but handed over to me in a coffee shop,” the 55-year-old man said.
According to Ahmad, he decided to apply for a Malaysian identity card because renewing his passport annually was tedious.
“I came to Kota Kinabalu from Ranau where I was working in 1990 and met a Bugis man who said he can help facilitate my application for a Malaysian identity card. I was instructed to go to a house in Sembulan where a man helped me to fill in an application form and took my thumb prints.
“The man asked for RM10 which was for the stamp duty. I went back to Ranau and three months later I received news that the identification card is ready for collection so I came to Kota Kinabalu and met with the Bugis man in a coffee shop where he handed me the identification document,” Ahmad told the panel.