Home Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin should ‘feel touched’ by the stories of all citizenship applicants, especially the stateless individuals in the country, instead of being attentive to certain individuals.

Selangau MP Baru Bian pointed this out in response to a news article quoting Hamzah as ‘feeling touched by the interfaith adoption case of Rohana Abdullah’.

The article also stated that the federal minister had instructed his officers to look into the matter.

In this regard, Baru said all applications for citizenship forwarded to the ministry should be looked into and investigated upon.

“The minister (Hamzah) should be ‘touched’ by all the applications (for citizenship) forwarded to his ministry, and all of them must be investigated upon.

“Indeed, what about the applications by the former Border Scouts from Lawas, who had fought to defend the sovereignty of Malaysia during the Confrontation of 1963?

“Shouldn’t it (their plight) ‘move’ the minister to order for an investigation as well?” pointed out Baru, who is also Ba Kelalan assemblyman.

He said the former Border Scouts had come to him as a last resort, in that they had been waiting for so long to get the government recognise them as Malaysian citizens.

Moreover, he said such citizenship issue had adversely affected their children and grandchildren as well.

“Doesn’t that (plight) move the minister?

“For the record, I forwarded their applications to the minister but to this day, the applicants are still waiting for the response from the overseeing department.

“I know there are many similar applications from Sarawak, and I do hope that the federal minister would appreciate every application and have these cases looked into and investigated upon,” he said.

It is said that seven former Border Scouts who served during the 1963 Confrontation – four of whom had had their plight highlighted by The Borneo Post in 2020 – are still waiting for the government to approve their citizenship applications.

In a news article published by a national daily yesterday, Hamzah was quoted as saying that he had ordered his officers to investigate the case of Rohana, who had applied for citizenship in 2016, but had received no response since.

Rohana was abandoned as a two-month-old baby at a kindergarten 22 years ago after her Indonesian mother returned to her home country.

The child was then raised by Chee Hoi Lan 83, a kindergarten teacher where Rohana’s mother worked as a cleaner.

Despite their religious and racial differences, Chee strove to ensure that Rohana could learn the basic teachings of Islam, have regular interactions with Muslims and uphold all obligations as a Muslim such as prayers and fasting.

Chee also made sure that Rohana would eat halal food.

Source:
courtesy of THE BORNEO POST

by JENIFER LAENG

If you have any stories or news that you would like to share with the global online community, please feel free to share it with us by contacting us directly at [email protected]