By Lim Kit Siang, MP for Gelang Patah

The Prime Minister, Najib Razak’s response yesterday to the Mabul attack by Sulu terrorists when he visited Sabah on Saturday night, resulting in the killing of a policeman and abduction of another, is not only too little, too late but also smacks of a cover-up.

Najib’s order to the Eastern Sabah Security Command (Esscom) to review the security system along the Eastern Sabah Security Zone (Esszone) to be more detailed so that it cannot be penetrated by enemies should have been his first directive when Esscom was established after the Lahad Datuk incursions in April last year and not after 15 months of its establishment chalking up a disastrous catalogue of murders, abductions and violation of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Sabah and Malaysia by Filipino terrorists.

Sabahans can still remember Najib’s boast at Esscom’s launch that Esscom was “the fastest decision made in the history of Malaysia in terms of creating posts in any government agency” but it has proved to be the most costly and unproductive of all government decisions, in terms of human lives, bad international image for the country, economic costs and public expenditures, resulting in a rare show of unity by Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Rakyat Members of Parliament denouncing the ineptitude of Esscom and even demanding its abolition and replacement by a more effective security high command structure in Sabah.

Sabahans in particular must be shocked that Najib’s response to the Mabul attack by armed Sulu gunmen completely omitted any reference to the Report of the Royal Commission if Inquiry into Illegal Immigrants (RCIII) in Sabah, when the Mabul attack and the poor security situation particularly in Eastern Sabah are all the result of “chickens coming home to roost” from decades of government inaction, indifference and even abetment (e.g. Mahathir’s Project M) on illegal immigrants turning the “Land Before the Wind” into a haven for kidnappers and terrorists and reducing Sabahans into strangers and even foreigners in their own land.

If the decades-long problem of illegal immigrants in Sabah, whose number now range from 1 million to 1.9 million out of Sabah’s population of 3.3 million, had been brought under strict control right from the beginning, we will not today be faced with the security and law-and-order crisis afflicting Sabah.

The RCIII Report, if it is to resolve the long-standing problem of illegal immigrants in Sabah, would have made recommendations impinging on the security of Sabah, particularly pertaining to Essone.

Why is there no mention or commitment by Najib for the immediate publication of the Report of the RCIII, especially as it is now exactly two months since the report was submitted to the Yang di Pertuan Agong and Putrajaya on May 14.

Is Najib prepared to get the Cabinet on Wednesday to make public the RCIII in Sabah report and implement its recommendations?

What has Najib to hide in the Report of the RCIII in Sabah that he seems to be spearheading a conspiracy of silence on it, as if wanting Sabahans and Malaysians to forget that there is such a RCIII in Sabah?