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It is early afternoon in the floating town of Kampung Bangau-Bangau, some uniformed students walk home on foot. They pass other children in threadbare clothes playing by the road.
These children do not attend school and not by choice, as they are all stateless.
According to the 2010 census, Sabah has the highest proportion of non-citizens in the country. One in four of the 3.9 million residents of Sabah are not citizens.
Kampung Bangau-Bangau is one of Sabah’s many floating villages, mostly occupied by non-citizens. For tourists heading to the famous islands around Semporna, it’s hard to miss the sprawling Kampung Bangau-Bangau, which is located next to the tourist jetty.
About 40 stateless children from the village receive basic education at Sekolah Alternatif Borneo Komrad in the adjacent Kampung Air.
The school’s founder, Mukmin Nantang, 26, runs the school together with Achmad Fatkur Raziq, 24.
In addition to writing and math, children learn basic skills such as commerce, agriculture, sewing, and cooking, among others.
More importantly, the school teaches children how to solve real-world problems that they would eventually face as stateless: exploitation at work, child marriages, sexual harassment, and more.
The goal, Mukmin said, was to teach the children skills they could use to survive in their circumstances.
“When we ask them ‘what is your ambition?’ They would answer ‘doctor’, ‘lawyer’ or ‘soldier’. But if we ask them ‘what will you do after you finish school’? ‘Or’ waiter ‘.
“It’s a shame, isn’t it? They have ambitions … But they understand the reality they’re in,” said Mukmin, who began her teaching career with Teach for the Needs before starting the first Sekolah Altenatif in Tawau in 2016.
At Sekolah Alternatif, students are encouraged to pursue their dreams. According to Mukmin, a doctor does not have to work in a hospital. Your students can become village midwife (village midwife).
A teacher, like him, need not be teaching in a public school. Sekolah Alternatif itself is a shack on stilts over sea water.
Siti Suhaimah Mustapa, 15, said Malaysiakini who aspires to be a professional teacher. Coincidentally, she is a part-time teacher at Sekolah Alternatif, teaching younger children.
Suhaimah was one of Mukmin’s first recruited students. In the early days of Sekolah Alternatif, Mukmin had to go from house to house to convince the parents and allow him to recruit their children.
Currently, Sekolah Alternatif is at a saturation point. They have to choose who signs up. Siblings of current students are given priority.
Achmad said that Sekolah Alternatif has to expand and that the plan was to establish more schools in the surrounding area.
“Perhaps we are currently helping only 1 percent of those in need. Hopefully, one day, they will help others. At least they will be able to read, count and avoid being exploited.”
“If you tell guys about their careers, they have all kinds of dreams, but they know where the limit is. What sets them apart from others is a piece of paper,” he added.
Sabrin Mohd Amrin, 18, said Malaysiakini who had to leave Sekolah Alternatif in 2017 to work at a job that required 13 hours a day and was paid RM 350 per month. She was 15 years old at the time.
Mukmin eventually convinced Sabrin’s mother that he could work at school and attend classes at the same time.
Now Sabrin attends class in the morning and sews bags that will be sold in the afternoon.
“It’s better now. I can help my mother a bit. I’m not sure how long I’ll be doing this, I have to help my parents,” he said.
Both Suhaimah and Sabrin are among the hundreds of stateless children in Kampung Bangau-Bangau. Statelessness is a perennial problem in Sabah, due to poverty, ignorance and illegal migration.
Some children became stateless because their parents inside did not register their birth in time. Others became stateless because at least one of their parents is a foreigner.
Siti Marina Salhati, 41, a resident of Kampung Bangau-Bangau, is a mother and a Malaysian citizen, but her children cannot go to school and therefore cannot go to school. Siti is one of several people Malaysiakini they learned that they did not register the birth of their children on time.
When talking to Malaysiakini, she was very sorry that her children could not attend school.
Achmad explained that there are bureaucratic problems that make it difficult for disadvantaged people to obtain identification cards for their children and this must be resolved.
Kampung Bangau-Bangau is in Bugaya, which is a hotly contested seat in these elections.
Read more: Who’s Who is Sabah 2020 Pick
Bugaya’s incumbent legislator, Manis Buka Mohd Darah (Warisan) and Mohd Daud Tampokong (Perikatan Nasional-Bersatu), when interviewed by Malaysiakini, acknowledged that statelessness was a problem in the constituency, but has no specific political positions to address it.
Daud, for example, expressed confidence that Interior Minister Hamzah Zainudin can solve it. Hamzah is also the general secretary of Bersatu.
Wan Shawaluddin Wan Hassan, Principal Investigator at the Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Heritage at the Universiti Malaysia Sabah, said solving problems related to stateless children was complex due to the sensitivities involved.
Read more: Sabah Decide 2020: Making sense of players, parties and battles
Shawaluddin, who once promoted the documentation of all births, including non-citizens, for record-keeping purposes, said the actual number of undocumented people in the state was uncertain and this made policy making difficult.
The fact that some of the new Covid-19 cases were brought into the country by people crossing borders illegally had added to the stigma.
“Stateless people are human too. We need to find a solution,” he said.
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