MA63 can’t be revived just by setting up special cabinet committee – Soo
KUCHING: The Malaysia Agreement 1963 ( MA63) cannot be revived simply by setting up a Special Cabinet Committee, said Sarawak Reform Party ( STAR) president Lina Soo.
She pointed out that the federal government should just comply with the MA63 without the need to revive, discuss, review or rectify it.
“The MA63 has been negotiated, signed and sealed on July 9, 1963, but never delivered. The treaty has remained on the shelf in a comatose state for 55 years.
“A review cannot be done without all signatory nations - Britain, Malaya, Sarawak, Sabah and Singapore - going back to the negotiating table,” she said in a statement yesterday.
She was commenting on the recent statement by Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law) Datuk Liew Vui Keong that a Special Cabinet Committee will be set up in response to Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s call to revive the agreement to honour all pledges outlined within it.
Soo stressed that to revive the MA63 by setting up another committee would be “aimless and fruitless without the political will of the signatory nation”.
She also opined that Liew had no authority to deal with MA63, an international treaty registered with United Nations ( UN).
“The Law Minister with his Special Cabinet Committee cannot deal in an international multilateral affair which requires the participation of the governments of Britain, Malaya, Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore.”
She added that if MA63 is still valid, all the federal government needs to do is to comply with everything that is laid down in the agreement.
“There is no need for further discussion, review and rectification.”