When seeing is not believing

A resort in Semporna, Sabah. But is it, really? We need to give the world the correct Sabah narrative, with footage actually taken on the ground in the state, says the writer.

“WHAT if the Philippines could reclaim a lost treasure, a piece of its history that has been out of reach for so long? What if Sabah, a land rich in history, culture, and abundant natural resources, could be reunited with its rightful home, the Philippines?”

That is the voice-over in the opening scene of a 10.42-minute video sent to me, accompanied with a Malaysian Foreign Ministry statement.

A regional intelligence officer contact sent them over an encrypted messaging app on Monday.

The Wisma Putra statement dated July 29 stated, “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is aware of a video circulating on social media containing baseless and misleading content that questions the sovereignty of the state of Sabah as an integral part of Malaysia.”

I watched the video.

At the start, the voiceover warns that “the video scenes are for visual purposes only”. The warning is apt as it looks like the video was produced without actually going to Sabah. The narration is accompanied by stock footage (stock video or B‑roll, pre‑filmed footage that can be purchased).

Some of the footage that is supposed to be on Sabah does not look like it was taken in my home state. One scene looks like it was taken in the ancient city of Angkor Wat in Cambodia or Ayutthaya in Thailand. Another visual of a floating market also looks like it was shot in Thailand.

It also has historical inaccuracies.

The video claims that “the Sulu Sultanate’s claim to Sabah is not a matter of historical conjecture. It is rooted in documented agreements and centuries of established presence”.

“In 1704, the Sultan of Brunei, grappling with internal conflicts, ceded Sabah to the Sulu Sultanate as a reward for their assistance.

“This pivotal moment marked the beginning of a new chapter in the history of Sabah,” the voiceover claims.

History is written by the victors. It can also be rewritten by those who were defeated.

My understanding of the history of North Borneo – as Sabah was called before it formed Malaysia with Sarawak, Peninsular Malaya, and Singapore in 1963 – is shaped by Shari Jeffri, a private researcher of North Borneo/Sabah history.

Shari’s house in Kota Kinabalu is filled with documents on North Borneo/Sabah that were secured from most of the world’s major archives, such as the Library of Congress in Washington DC, Britain’s archives in Kew, the British Library in London, the Univer-sity of London’s School of Oriental Studies, and Spain’s National Archives and National Library.

Referring to Cesar Adib Majul’s Muslims in the Philippines published in 1973, Shari said the Philippine/Sulu Sultanate’s claim on Sabah originated from the Chermin (or Kinarut) War, which lasted from 1660 to 1673.

Quoting Dr Haji Awang Mohd Jamil Al Sufri’s Tarsilah Brunei (1997), Shari said that in 1672, the Sultan of Brunei, Sultan Muhyiddin, sent an envoy to his cousin the Sulu Sultan (the son of Sultan Muawalit Wasit Bongsu also known as Pangeran Shahbandar Maharajalela of Brunei), asking for his aid in the war and promising him territories in North Borneo as a reward. However, the Sulu Sultanate did not fight or contribute to Sultan Muhyiddin’s victory.

Referring to LR Wright’s The Origin of British Borneo (1970), Shari told me that “succeeding Sultans of Brunei have denied that northern Borneo (Sabah) was given to Sulu”.

The Sulu Sultanate narrative, he explained, is that North Borneo belonged to them as a reward for helping the Brunei Sultan quell a Bruneian civil war in 1672. But, he said, the reality is the Sultan of Brunei never gave anything to the Sulu Sultan as the latter did not aid him in that war. So while the Sulu Sultanate has claimed a part of North Borneo, it never owned it.

Under Brunei Sultanate rule before the 19th century, the East Coast of North Borneo was always the territory of the Pangeran Temmenggung of Brunei, as stipulated in the 1877 treaties between Pangeran Temmengung of Brunei and Ovebeck-Dent.

Let’s fast forward to 1877.

On Dec 28 of that year, Brunei signed four treaties and a commission granting diplomat, businessman, and adventurer Baron von Overbeck and colonial merchant and entrepreneur Alfred Dent territories in North Borneo. The significance of the agreements is that Brunei had ceded North Borneo to von Overbeck and Dent, who later started the British North Borneo Company.

A month later, on Jan 22, 1878, Sulu Sultan Jamal Al Alam signed a treaty with von Overbeck and Dent granting the two businessmen part of North Borneo.

“If you look at the legal perspective – as a banker, I study agreements – if you have already acquired the areas with one party [Brunei in 1877], the second agreement [with the Sulu Sultan in 1878] is not valid. It [the 1878 agreement] is an afterthought,” Shari said.

“After signing the four treaties and commission for the whole territory of North Borneo – except the interior – with the Brunei Sultanate, von Overbeck and Dent were advised and felt the need to sign another treaty with the Sulu Sultanate for a territory that was claimed by them, especially the East Coast of North Borneo and surrounding islands, for ease of business transactions and administration of the area.”

He explained that signing the second agreement was a way of addressing the piracy situation on North Borneo’s East Coast:

“The east coast was unruly, as the Sulu Sultanate claimed it. And as von Overbeck and Dent did not want to have any headaches, they signed the treaty with the Sulu Sultan.”

When Putrajaya deals with the Sabah claims, the claimants often talk about the Jan 22, 1878, agreement between Sultan Jamal Al Alam and von Overbeck and Dent.

However, this ignores the fact that the two European businessmen had a prior agreement with Brunei.

“The 1877 and 1878 treaties will explain the weight of both Sultanates’ claim in the matter of North Borneo’s sovereignty and influence.

“That is Sabah’s narrative,” said Shari.

“It’s a royal family dispute and misunderstanding manipulated by people with vested interest for far too long that create confusion.”

Wisma Putra is reacting to a video produced by a Philippines YouTube channel. We shouldn’t react.

But we should be proactive. We should be giving the world the correct Sabah narrative, with footage actually taken on the ground in the state and in Sulu.