Friday’s night kidnapping of four Malaysian crewmen by armed Filipino gunmen near Pulau Ligitan off Semporna in the east coast of Sabah has again shocked the nation.
The Sabah Eastern Security Command (Esscom) was established in 2013 to ensure the safety of Sabah from terrorist activities. Yet kidnapping incidents have continued to happen since, despite the fact that government leaders have again and again stressed that improvements would be made and Sabah was safe.
How are the people and tourists to have confidence in Esscom if such incidents cannot be prevented?
On February 20 this year, Britain had joined Australia and New Zealand in warning citizens against travel to coastal islands of Sabah bordering the Philippines, citing high threats to foreigners of kidnapping and criminality. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office had raised the terrorism threat level for the islands to “high” from “general,” and advised against all but essential travel.
In an immediate response, Esscom commander Datuk Wan Abdul Bari Wan Abdul Khalid assured that security in Sabah’s east coast remained tight and under control.
Datuk Wan Abdul Bari has to explain if he did take any extra security measures after the United Kingdom government’s warning, and if so, why were the measures ineffective in preventing Friday’s incident?
After each past incident, there would be explanations and assurances, the people are waiting to see what will be the explanation this time.
In May 2015, a female restaurant owner and a Sarawakian male at a seafood restaurant were kidnapped and I had asked “Can ESSCOM really provide the safety? Can we trust the Government’s assurances? Will heads roll for the latest security breach?”
These are the same questions that the people especially Sabahans want to know and let’s see what will the government leaders say.