The statements by Wisma Putra, Petronas, the Prime Minister Dauk Seri Najib Razak and former Prime Minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi all have one common purpose – to avoid answering two important questions:
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When and why Malaysia ceded away Malaysian sovereignty to two oil and gas-rich offshore areas in South China Sea, namely Block L and Block M, in favour of Brunei; and
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Whether and if so, when Brunei had surrendered its territorial claim of sovereignty to Limbang and recognized full Malaysian sovereignty instead.
Although Wisma Putra, Petronas, Najib and Abdullah know fully well that their statements would be scrutinized for answers to these two most important questions, all their verbiage have one common thrust to avoid answer to these two questions.
This can only raise suspicions to crisis point.
I call on Najib to release a full chronological order of the events resulting in the ceding of Malaysian sovereignty to Blocks L and M to Brunei and the position of Brunei’s territorial claim to Limbang, whether and if so when, Brunei had surrendered its claim of sovereignty to Limbang.
Another former Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir had estimated that the worth of oil and gas rights for Blocks L and M are in the region of US$100 billion (RM320 billion) – no paltry sum for any Prime Minister or Government to trifle with to avoid full public accountability.
As Prime Minister for 22 years, Mahathir’s statement that Blocks L and M had been claimed by Malaysia based on historical facts and that based on Malaysia’s sovereignty, Petronas had entered into a production sharing contract with Murphy Oil to start drilling to produce oil estimated at one million barrels, cannot be ignored.
Was Mahathir misinformed when he blogged last week that Abdullah had negotiated with the Sultan of Brunei to get back Limbang in Sarawak in return for the surrender of the two Blocks to Brunei and that Brunei had beaten Malaysia in the diplomatic game in securing the sovereignty for the two Blocks L and M without surrendering its sovereignty claim to Limbang?
Najib should issue a White Paper to throw full light on this issue without any further delay. The Battle of Prime Ministers over Malaysia’s sovereignty to Blocks L and M and to Limbang is not doing the Najib Administration and Tun Abdullah’s reputation any good.