By DayakDaily Team
KUCHING, May 24: Parti Bumi Kenyalang (PBK) and the Sabah Sarawak Rights Australia New Zealand (SSRANZ) have slammed the recently signed Joint Declaration on Petroliam Nasional Bhd (PETRONAS) and Petroleum Sarawak Bhd (PETROS), criticising that “nothing has changed”—and that the move merely cements Sarawak’s role as a “delivery boy” in the nation’s oil and gas industry.
In a joint statement today, PBK president Voon Lee Shan and SSRANZ president Robert Pei claimed the declaration is not a victory for Sarawak but rather “the final surrender” of its oil and gas rights, reducing the State’s ambitions of autonomy to political theatre.
“It is not a legally binding agreement. It does not confer any new legal rights to Sarawak. It is a political smokescreen designed to mislead the public into thinking the ownership issue has been resolved.
“It changes nothing. PETRONAS remains the legal owner, controller, and profiteer of Sarawak’s petroleum resources under the unconstitutional Petroleum Development Act 1974 (PDA74). The public outrage on social media shows that Sarawakians are not fooled,” they said.
According to Voon and Pei, the “backroom deal” only formalised Sarawak’s position as “delivery boy” in Malaysia’s oil and gas industry, reducing PETROS to a “middleman” that buys gas at prices dictated by PETRONAS and resells it, rather than acting as a true co-owner or decision-maker.
They were responding to recent announcements that the federal government and Sarawak had reached an understanding on oil and gas matters through the Joint Declaration signed by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and Sarawak Premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg.
They also lambasted the Sarawak government for failing to uphold transparency and due legislative process in concluding the deal, which they said lacked any endorsement from the Sarawak Legislative Assembly or movement toward repealing the PDA74, the Continental Shelf Act 1966 (CSA66), and the Territorial Sea Act 2012 (TSA2012)—the three main colonial-era laws that they claim have illegally stripped Sarawak of its resource sovereignty.
“Instead, Sarawak is now made complicit in the very framework that robbed it.
“The people can see clearly that: this is not cooperation, it is capitulation; this is not sovereignty, it is subjugation; this is not a partnership, it is political theatre,” they stated.
Voon and Pei further accused the ruling Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) coalition of legitimising federal laws it once deemed unconstitutional, and questioned the timing of the declaration, suggesting it was crafted to pacify Sarawakians ahead of upcoming elections.
“We call on the Sarawak government and GPS coalition to answer: Why are you validating laws your government once declared unconstitutional? Why are you dressing up betrayal as a win? Why is there no push to repeal the PDA74 or assert full jurisdiction over our continental shelf?”
Asserting that “after 60 years of false federation, nothing has changed—except the packaging,” the two leaders urged Sarawakians to reflect on whether they should continue to tolerate what they termed “a system of exploitation and deceit.”
“This is not rebellion—it is restoration. This is not defiance—it is duty,” the statement concluded. — DayakDaily
