By Chong Eng Leong
Senior Advisor to Party Warisan, Kota Kinabalu Division.
KOTA KINABALU: Chief Minister Hajiji Noor’s latest announcement recognising the Unified Examination Certificate (UEC) and promising scholarship opportunities for its holders is nothing new. It is simply another example of GRS copying Warisan’s policies while pretending to show “leadership.”
Let us set the record straight:
First, UEC recognition was approved under the Warisan-led government.
When Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal was Chief Minister, the state cabinet formally decided to recognise the UEC as part of Warisan’s inclusive education agenda. That decision was celebrated as a historic step toward educational equality in Sabah.
Second, Hajiji ridiculed and resisted these very same policies.
When Warisan first championed UEC recognition and student-friendly financial aid such as easing PTPTN burdens, GRS leaders dismissed them as “unrealistic” and “populist.” Yet today, Hajiji stands before Sabahans trying to repackage these reforms as his own.
Third, copying without acknowledgement is not leadership — it is hypocrisy.
If GRS truly cared about education, it would at least have the humility to admit that these are Warisan’s policies — the very ones Hajiji and his allies once opposed. Instead, the people are treated to political theatre where old ideas are recycled under new slogans.
Hajiji likes to boast of “concern for the people,” but real concern means having vision, courage, and integrity — not following in Shafie’s footsteps while pretending to lead.
The people of Sabah are not fooled. They know who first recognised UEC. They know who first proposed easing the burdens on students. And they know that Hajiji’s government is built on betrayal, hypocrisy, and borrowed ideas.
Sabah deserves a government with originality and sincerity — not one that survives by copying Warisan’s blueprint for progress.
