THE plan to begin a mass crackdown to deport the estimated 100,000 to 150,000 illegal immigrants in Sabah seems straightforward enough. While we still need to rely heavily on foreign workers to do the jobs that Malaysians won't, we do not welcome those who sneak across the borders or the seas. It is not the first time that we have repatriated undocumented migrants and it won't be the last. We have deported hundreds of thousands and will continue to do so. The only difference is that the numbers can be expected to rise sharply now that the drive to expel them will be intensified. With the volume expected to swell, the sensible thing to do is to make sure that the deportation is manageable and orderly, the transit camps can accommodate the big numbers of deportees, and the rights of the deportees are not violated. It would not do for diplomatic relations to become strained because of deplorable facilities at the transit camps and other abuses.

However, while it is as important to get the cooperation of Indonesia and the Philippines in preventing them from coming back as it is in assisting us in sending them home, it will not be easy to solve the problem of unwanted and unwelcome immigrants. The borders are porous, the seas are not watertight, the guardians at the checkpoints and the officials behind the desks cannot always be trusted to secure the borders, and the economy remains an irresistible magnet for those looking for a better life. Indeed, there are many ways for the desperate and the resourceful to circumvent and defy the regulatory and punitive measures designed to keep them out.

Neither are things so simple in Sabah where it is not just a matter of making a distinction between legal and illegal immigrants as it is in the rest of the country. It is complicated by the fact that there are large numbers of asylum seekers, refugees, stateless people and street children. Many are also not a transient population who are here today and gone tomorrow. Now that a quarter of the population of Sabah are not native-born, intense attention has been focused on the implications of this demographic shift on the distribution of power. With allegations about an official hand in Project IC to engineer this change and influence the verdict at the ballot box in exchange for citizenship, immigration has become no longer just an issue of law and order. It has become a political issue that demands a political approach.