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Sabah's list of ethnics and sub-ethnics to be endorsed, gazetted soon, says Masidi
KOTA KINABALU, Feb 13, 2015:
Efforts are undertaken to endorse Sabah’s 42 ethnic groups and over 200 sub-ethnics as part of the move to do away the “lain-lain” (others) words for the race column in official government forms.
Sabah Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun, in disclosing this, said he would be tabling the list of ethnics and sub-ethnics in next week’s Cabinet meeting for endorsement.
“We will meet on Feb 18 and after this step, we will submit the list to the government, particularly the National Registration Department, to be gazetted, so they have a reference of the races of people in Sabah,” he told reporters after closing the Sabah Ethnic and Sub-Ethnic Listing and Classification Workshop here today.
The workshop was carried out to identify the ethnicity of Sabahans.
“When all is done, Sabahans may just write down their ethnicity in the race column. The words ‘lain-lain’ for the race column may no longer be a problem, except for ‘lain-lain hal’ (other matters),” he said.
Earlier, Masidi called on the event organisers, namely the Sabah Cultural Board and Sabah Native Affairs Office, to hold similar programmes at least once biennially.
“This is to allow us to review the list. Who knows if we find new ethnics, which may have been left out due to its small numbers,” citing the Bonggi people, who are mainly found in an island in Banggi, only rediscovered about a decade ago.
He also asked people to notify either the two institutions or the state government should their race be left out of the list.
“We want all races in Sabah to be represented and listed,” Masidi concluded.
Both states in East Malaysia have decided to do away with the “lain-lain” words in the race column on its official government forms.
