KOTA KINABALU: Kota Belud MP Isnaraissah Munirah Majilis has urged the Federal Government to initiate legal measures against controversial Spanish arbitrator Dr Gonzalo Stampa for his illegal actions.
“We need to take action against those who are behind them, those people who contributed to them, financed them.
“We need to protect our sovereignty,” she said.
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She said Putrajaya must initiate “government-to-government” discussions with Manila to drop the purported Philippines' claim on Sabah, says Kota Belud MP Isnaraissah Munirah Majilis.
She said that Putrajaya should talk to Filipino President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr to drop his country’s Republic Act 5446 which was enacted in 1968 by his father who was the president then.
“We need to initiate government-to-government talks to ask Bongbong Marcos to drop the Republic Act 5446 signed by his father in 1968,” she said Wednesday.
In 1968, the Republic Act 5446 or the law on Philippine baselines included “the territory of Sabah, situated in North Borneo, over which the Republic of the Philippines has acquired dominion and sovereignty.”
It was amended in 2009, but a Philippines supreme court decision said Republic 9522 or the Baselines Law still did not relinquish the Philippines' claim to Sabah.
Munirah said Manila needs to drop the matter as Sabah had made self-determination under United Nations to form Malaysia along with Sarawak, Malaya and Singapore on Sept 16, 1963 (Singapore left Malaysia on August 9, 1965).
“We need to protect our sovereignty under the Federation of Malaysia.
“Most importantly, this issue needs to be addressed at Asean as well as at the United Nations,” said Munirah, who is Parti Warisan women’s wing chief.
She was commenting on the discussions by prominent speakers at the just concluded International Arbitration Colloquium 2023 held here on July 4.
Among others, the discussions touched on Sabah’s historical links with Brunei and the so-called claims of the Sulu Sultanate, which many speakers argued that the sultanate did not rule over parts of North Borneo (now Sabah).
Legal experts who spoke also said that Stampa had acted illegally in asking Malaysia to pay US$14.94bil (RM68.8bil) in his arbitration Feb 28, 2022, award for the eight Filipinos claiming to be heirs of the defunct Sultanate.
During the colloquium, Sabah lawyer Tengku Datuk Fuad Ahmad also suggested that Putrajaya pursues legal action against Stampa as well as the Filipinos. He said that there was enough evidence to indicate that Stampa had acted beyond his appointment as an arbitrator when he issued the final award in Paris when he had no authority to do so.
“Normally, arbitrators are immune from civil or criminal suits while undertaking their duties as arbitrators. But in this case, there’s enough evidence to show he was not an arbitrator when he issued the award,” Fuad said.
