INSIDE ISSUES
The Sabah State Assembly
The theme of Commonwealth Day was ‘A Young
Commonwealth’ and I pick up on that topic in my ‘View’ – written as Acting Secretary General and Director of Finance of the CPA – where I highlight the profound importance of primary education in national development. This issue of our magazine also includes a number of articles from Sabah, Malaysia, which hosts the CPA Mid-Year Executive Committee Meeting in May. In his contribution, Joniston Bangkuai focuses on the state’s decision to push forest conservation to the top of its agenda. This included making the initially painful decision to forego income from logging to move towards a sustainable harvest approach together with an emphasis on tourism. “Switching from conventional logging to sustainable harvesting was perhaps one of the most difficult decisions the state government had
to make,” he says. “Sabah was hugely dependent on timber for revenue, and opting for sustainable forestry management meant making sacrifices such as losing short- term monetary gains.” These are just a few highlights from what is an extremely broad range of topics in this issue. You can also read a contribution from Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee in the United Kingdom, Rt Hon. Keith Vaz MP who writes a particularly timely article on the phenomena of individuals travelling overseas to fight for terrorist organisations, including the major problem of what to do when they return. “What motivates someone to leave their life in the West to fight for a group which wishes to establish a medieval, brutal caliphate thousands of miles away, is the question which haunts intelligence officials.”
Mr Vaz writes. “What haunts them more, is what to do with them if they return.” That topic, along with financial scrutiny, empowering indigenous peoples, trade- union accountability, the role of women parliamentarians, codes of conduct and much else besides are all tackled inside. There is also our usual selection of parliamentary reports from around the Commonwealth.
The Parliamentarian exists to support the CPA in its stated purpose of developing, promoting and supporting parliamentarians and their staff to identify benchmarks of good governance and to implement the enduring values of the Commonwealth. We trust you will find this opening issue for 2015 to be both interesting and informative.
Mr Joe Omorodion
Acting Secretary-General and Director of Finance
The Parliamentarian | 2015: Issue One | 5
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“In her ‘View’ the Rt Hon. Rebecca Kadaga, MP,
Chairperson of the CWPs and Speaker of the Parliament of Uganda, makes a point that gender equality is an issue for all – inequalities hinder economic development for everyone.”
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