KUCHING: Sarawak’s interest is safeguarded by the incorporation of the Malaysia Agreement and the terms of the Cobbold Commission Report into the Federal Constitution.
Sarawak Legislative Assembly (DUN) Deputy Speaker Datuk Idris Buang said all of Sarawak’s sovereign rights to its natural resources are therefore well locked in that supreme document.
He said this in response to former Minister in the Prime Minister Department (Legal Affairs and Judicial Reform), Datuk Zaid Ibrahim’s reaction over Sarawak’s “instant claim” of its interest, regarding the new discovery of six oil wells recently discovered offshore Sarawak.
Idris said the Petroleum Development Act (PDA) 1974 was never meant to surrender Sarawak’s sovereignty over its natural resources particularly oil and gas or other related minerals to the Federal Government as PDA 1974 was and still subservient and subordinate to the Federal Constitution.
“We can get a court declaration at the highest level on this, if the parties wish to. The PDA 1974, as every Tom, Dick and Harry knows, was a politically designed move to boost the economic future of Malaysia in light of the rise of the oil and gas industry amid the world petroleum crisis then.
“Sarawak being then a small poor and weak party was pinned down to its core ‘to agree’ to the PDA without it being legitimately approved by its State Assembly.
“It was signed only by the then Chief Minister, the late Tun Abdul Rahman Yakub, for a meagre annual five per cent ‘cash consideration’, in order to see some workable arrangement to exploit the oil and gas in Sarawak for the good of all Malaysia,” he said.
Idris said Sarawak was in a dire state of survival because it was then still licking its wounds from the wars with the communist terrorists and Confrontation with Indonesia which saw approximately 90 per cent of its rakyat virtually living below the universal poverty level.
“Meanwhile, the Commercial Arrangement Agreement circa 2020 with Petronas was a mutual arrangement diplomatically arrived in order to have a win-win situation for both parties and so as not to disrupt the oil and gas with the already established Petronas presence in Sarawak,” Idris said.
He hoped Zaid would as such respect the law as it is.
“Do not get too emotional so as to lose your sense of legal understanding,” he said.
Recently, Premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg stated that Petros, the state owned oil and gas exploration firm, has yet to be directly involved in the management of the six oil wells.
He said the state has arrangements within the commercial agreement between the state and Petronas, namely a clause called carried interest within Sarawak waters.
“Based on the agreement, Petronas should divide half of its equity with Sarawak,” he said.
