Beach Politics
Here I am at the beach in Sihanoukville in Southern Cambodia. And boy, I really needed a bit of a holiday from my travels. That may sound strange, but truly the kind of travelling I do can be quite strenuous - every second or third day on a hot, cramped bus/boat/plane and the planning and organizing of the aforementioned bus/boat/plane trips, finding new accommodation for every town, whizzing around on the backs of motorbike-taxis... whew! A girl needs some quality time on the beach every now and then!
Now personally I find few things are as boring to write about, as beach locations; what can one write about - describe the texture of the sand, the hue of the sunset, the coconuts of the palm trees? The beach is here, wish you were wonderful...
Therefore I shall take this opportunity to time-warp my way back to Borneo and share with you a strange chapter in the history of Sabah, as recounted by the mysterious Ms V; the story of how the state of Sabah ended up as the poorest state in Malaysia, though it has more oil than Brunei and therefore produces a great part of the wealth of the country.
Once upon a time, there was a righteous dude called Tun Fuad Stevens. He was the first Chief Minister of the state of Sabah, and played a fundamental role in bringing the state of Sabah into the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. By all accounts he belonged to that rare, visionary breed of politician, who did things for the best interests of his state, not for the best interests of himself and his family, as all too often seems to be the case in these (and many other) parts of the world. To this end, he was also opposed to outright signing off all the oil rights of Sabah to the state of Malaysia - some states in Malaysia still own the right to the revenue from their own oil to this day.
In June of 1976 the whole cabinet of Sabah attended a meeting or training day or some such on the East coast of the state. After the meeting they all trooped off to the airport to return to the state capital Kota Kinabalu in a private, twin-engine aircraft. At the very last minute before the doors were shut, one memeber of the cabinet - I shall call him Mr Pink (not so much for the sake of discretion, but because I'm so bad at names, I can't remember his anymore) - abruptly said he had to get off the plane, since he had some urgent business he needed to attend to before he left. So the Chief Minister and all his cabinet (apart from Mr Pink) flew off for Kota Kinabalu.
On approaching Kota Kinabalu the captain radioed in his approach and asked for clearance to land. The flight control replied that the plane was not clear for landing and would have to circle for a while. So the captain dutifully cirled, asked again for landing clearance, which again was denied and the plane asked to circle. This was repeated four times and always, landing was denied to the plane. Now it is worth noting that this was a plane carrying the Chief Minister and entire (minus Mr Pink) cabinet of the state, yet they were denied again and again - and from personal experience I can say, that there isn't so much air traffic in Sabah (even less in the 70's I would suppose) to easily explain this.
The fifth time the plane was circling, it blew up in mid air killing everyone inside.
The next day, Mr Pink, as the only surviving member of the cabinet became acting Chief Minister - and that same day, less than 24 hours after the accident, he signed away all of Sabah's oil rights to the state of Malaysia without compensation (to the state that is, to the state!). He himself and his family mysteriously got very very very rich very very very quickly.
And they (Mr Pink and his family that is) lived happily ever after!
With this little bedtime story I leave you all for now and head on back to my wonderful, wonderful seaside room, barely six meters from the breaking waves, with a shady and wonderfully windy balcony opening to the sea. My little nugget of luxury!
Now personally I find few things are as boring to write about, as beach locations; what can one write about - describe the texture of the sand, the hue of the sunset, the coconuts of the palm trees? The beach is here, wish you were wonderful...
Therefore I shall take this opportunity to time-warp my way back to Borneo and share with you a strange chapter in the history of Sabah, as recounted by the mysterious Ms V; the story of how the state of Sabah ended up as the poorest state in Malaysia, though it has more oil than Brunei and therefore produces a great part of the wealth of the country.
Once upon a time, there was a righteous dude called Tun Fuad Stevens. He was the first Chief Minister of the state of Sabah, and played a fundamental role in bringing the state of Sabah into the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. By all accounts he belonged to that rare, visionary breed of politician, who did things for the best interests of his state, not for the best interests of himself and his family, as all too often seems to be the case in these (and many other) parts of the world. To this end, he was also opposed to outright signing off all the oil rights of Sabah to the state of Malaysia - some states in Malaysia still own the right to the revenue from their own oil to this day.
In June of 1976 the whole cabinet of Sabah attended a meeting or training day or some such on the East coast of the state. After the meeting they all trooped off to the airport to return to the state capital Kota Kinabalu in a private, twin-engine aircraft. At the very last minute before the doors were shut, one memeber of the cabinet - I shall call him Mr Pink (not so much for the sake of discretion, but because I'm so bad at names, I can't remember his anymore) - abruptly said he had to get off the plane, since he had some urgent business he needed to attend to before he left. So the Chief Minister and all his cabinet (apart from Mr Pink) flew off for Kota Kinabalu.
On approaching Kota Kinabalu the captain radioed in his approach and asked for clearance to land. The flight control replied that the plane was not clear for landing and would have to circle for a while. So the captain dutifully cirled, asked again for landing clearance, which again was denied and the plane asked to circle. This was repeated four times and always, landing was denied to the plane. Now it is worth noting that this was a plane carrying the Chief Minister and entire (minus Mr Pink) cabinet of the state, yet they were denied again and again - and from personal experience I can say, that there isn't so much air traffic in Sabah (even less in the 70's I would suppose) to easily explain this.
The fifth time the plane was circling, it blew up in mid air killing everyone inside.
The next day, Mr Pink, as the only surviving member of the cabinet became acting Chief Minister - and that same day, less than 24 hours after the accident, he signed away all of Sabah's oil rights to the state of Malaysia without compensation (to the state that is, to the state!). He himself and his family mysteriously got very very very rich very very very quickly.
And they (Mr Pink and his family that is) lived happily ever after!
With this little bedtime story I leave you all for now and head on back to my wonderful, wonderful seaside room, barely six meters from the breaking waves, with a shady and wonderfully windy balcony opening to the sea. My little nugget of luxury!
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