The foreign incursion into Malaysian territory of Sabah has shed a poor light on the part of the Malaysian Government in handling such incidents. This incident happened on 9 February and a deadly ambush yesterday 1 March ended in an apparent shootout reportedly killing 14 and wounding 3.
Malaysians are appalled by the way the incident was mismanaged and calls for a thorough review of protocols to prevent another fiasco from happening again in the future. We believe that Malaysia has not sent a strong and firm signal to all foreign parties who may harbor similar intents. Hence, the Home Minister, Defense Minister and Foreign Minister as well as the Prime Minister must make amends immediate to fix this.
The chronology is taken from TMI here. The chronology is attributed to Bernama. Commentaries are inserted in bold.
Chronology of intrusion by Lahad Datu rebels
KUALA LUMPUR, March 2 — The following is the chronology of events pertaining to the intrusion into Lahad Datu, Sabah by an armed group from the southern Philippines:
February 9 — The group enters Malaysian waters in a boat and begins to gather in stages at Felda Sahabat 17, Kampung Tanduo in Lahad Datu.
A few pertinent questions must be answered.
- How did this group managed to slip past our border security by boat? Did they come by many vessels or a large one, enough to ferry 180 people (the number as reported here.) This is not a trivial covert affair and our border security must have been sleeping on the job. Where was our Navy and Maritimes (our Marine Police rolled into a new outfit)? Even having Scorpene submarines cannot seem to help.
Proud 2B Malaysian 