The British have been kind to Sarawak. They only colonised us for a very short period of 17 years, probably the shortest in the history of the British Empire . Don’t know why, probably ours was a territory they found not worth keeping. Even then, they planned for our future, and drew a roadmap which included gazetting a large Sarawak sea boundary for us. They persuaded us to join up with Malaya to secure our future in a backdrop of hostile environment where Indonesia wanted to ‘ganyang’ Malaysia and The Philippines to annex Sabah. They even prepared the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63), an international document to protect Sarawak and Sabah, just in case Malaya too wanted to gobble us up once we were in the Federation.
Despite the above, a series of Acts were passed by Malaysian Parliament that infringed our rights under the MA63. The most prominent was The Petroleum Development Act(1974), its impact was discussed at length in Part 1 of this article.
In part 2 now, I wish to dwell into another transgression case which reduced Sarawak’s and Sabah’s territorial areas into less than half of what it used to be. Yes, Sarawak only has less than half of it now compared to what we had when Malaysia was formed. Of course, it was taken away illegally from us under the Territorial Sea Act (2012) but never consented to by the Sarawak Dewan Undangan Negeri.
Other relevant Acts also secured rights over resources in the continental Shelf for the Federal Government, such as the Continental Shelf Act 1966 and the Exclusive Economic Zone Act 1984.
Instead, Sarawakians were and still are preoccupied with land issues, something they hold dear in their hearts.
Thanks to the current Chief Minister Abang Jo for sending a high powered Sarawak legal team led by YB Sharifah Hasidah to London recently. The result was remarkable, the team uncovered bundles of documents that strengthened our position in the struggle to wrestle back our huge resources offshore. This includes oil and natural gas, fishery resources and corals; perhaps some sunken treasure ships, new island that may yet to emerge and even perhaps volcanoes, who knows.
The long and consistent efforts of some Sabah politicians too ought to be appreciated in this fight for Sabah and Sarawak rights. And now combined efforts of the Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Shafie Apdal and Abang Jo are very much anticipated and lauded by all quarters.
Offshore and Territorial Waters Taken Away
The area of Sarawak on Malaysia Day consisted of a land area of 124,450 sq kilometres and a large sea area estimated at not less than 160,000 sq km adjacent to its coastline extending 200 nautical miles into the sea over and including its continental shelf and all the resources above and below the seabed. The Sabah territorial area on the other hand consists of 73,631 sq km of land area and a sea area estimated at twice that size as implied in the above link.
Sabah’s and Sarawak’s boundaries had been extended to include the above continental shelf in 1954 with a Queen’s Order in Council prior to the formation of Malaysia. The Sarawak sea boundary was also determined by Sarawak Government Gazette Extraordinary Part II Dated June 30, 1954 which extended it to include the area of the continental shelf. This sea boundary is in line with the notion of Exclusive Economic Zone legally recognised by all sovereign nations.
The Territorial Sea Act (2012) together with the related earlier Acts were passed by Malaysian parliament to annex the above territorial sea and offshore areas from Sarawak and Sabah and with that, the petroleum resources and by implication, fishery resources and any other resources lying in these areas.
Loss of Petroleum Resources
The Oil and Natural Gas produced in the Sarawak waters are estimated to amount to RM 50.4 bil annually at crude oil price equivalent of USD 87.00 per barrel as achieved in the year 2014 bringing in MR 19.4 bil. for PETRONAS. This amount could have belonged to Sarawak or its very own PETROS, if Sarawak has exercised it rights over petroleum resources irrespective of the Petroleum Development Act 1974.
PETRONAS now has a staff strength of 51,000 and runs two Petrochemical complexes one each in Terengganu and Gebeng in Pahang; while a third complex will soon be completed in Pengerang Johore, thus creating a series of integrated complexes maximising the multiplier effects of petroleum production in Semenanjung, with large contribution to industrial development and employment of highly skilled workforce.
PETRONAS in Sarawak now produces approximately 40% of Oil and natural Gas for Malaysia but with no related petrochemical industry and only employs a miserable number of not more than 2,500 employees. This is no accident as it is the deliberate policy of PETRONAS to only use Sarawak as its workhorse to earn export revenue from oil and natural gas production.
Now imagine with 40% of the national petroleum production, what it can do to Sarawak’s economy. It could transform Sarawak’s economy and appearance with integrated petrochemical complexes and employed more than 20,000 workers with a large number in highly paid workforce in the managerial, executive and skilled categories. That is a lot of jobs and future for our youngsters even before taking into account spinoff effects of these industries.
Marine Fisheries Resources
The marine fisheries resources may be classified into coastal fisheries for areas close to the state shores and offshore fisheries to cover areas further from the shores but within the exclusive economic zone extending up to 200 nautical miles offshore. The relevant Federal laws are Fisheries Act 1985, Exclusive Economic Zone Act 1984 and Continental Shelf Act 1966 which together grant Federal Government exclusive powers to exercise over the Sarawak marine Fisheries resources.
All the above Acts were passed after the Malaysia Day and long after the 1954 Sarawak Government Gazette Extraordinary Part II which determined the Sarawak Sea Boundary. In this regard the legality of the Federal Acts are questionable as they were passed without regard to the pre-existing Sarawak laws.
For the year 2016 marine fisheries landing in Malaysia was 1.6 mil tonnes valued at RM 10.2 bil. of which Sarawak only accounted for about 160,000 tonnes valued at approx RM 1.1 bil. From the above figure it is obvious that Sarawak marine fish landing only accounts for 10% of the whole country in spite of its large fishery coastal and offshore waters.
The above figures indicate the Federal Government has not done a good job to develop marine fishing industry in Sarawak. Judging by the size of our coastal and offshore waters, it should be reasonable to expect a more developed industry with marine fish landing of around 25% of the total country’s harvest which should amount to approx 400,000 tonnes valued at RM 2.55 bil. annually. Deep sea fishing should focus on pelagic fisheries which are in great demand as evidenced by high Malaysian annual import volume. Some 300,000 tonnes of pelagic fisheries can be sustainably harvested annually in the Sarawak waters.
Current value contribution of the fishing industry to Sarawak’s economy may be less significant than that of the petroleum industry, but it would contribute to more employment opportunities. Right now there are 16,000 fishermen in Sarawak. An industry developed to its potential should be able to employ 40,000 fishermen plus more workforce to be generated in the related sectors. Such potential shall definitely play a critical role in the development and income growth of people living in the coastal belt.
The Sarawak government is strongly urged to take over the development and regulatory roles in the fishing industry since the coastal and offshore waters rightly belong to Sarawak. Furthermore fisheries fall under the ‘concurrent list’ in the Malaysian Constitution.
Conclusion
The above are the two important industries that have been taken over by the Federal Government by way of infringements of the provisions of Malaysia Agreement 1963(MA63). There are a few more industries affected and there are also other issues of infringements that affect Sarawak and Sabah in areas of government administration, government financing, government contracts procedures and more. We shall look at these related issues in subsequent parts of this article.
DAH IKHWAN
Please also read related articles:
!. Why MA63 Matters to Sarawak and Sabah.
2. Petroleum Royalty: Petronas vs Producing States.
Excellent article. Every fair minded person would agree that what belongs to Sarawak should rightfully return to Sarawak.