By Datuk Michael Malanjun
Deputy Chairman
KDCA Penampang District.
The official birthday celebration of the Yang Di-Pertua Negeri Sabah, Tun Musa Aman was reported in the press as to commence on March 30, 2025 and will continue until June 21, 2025.
The main organizing committee added that seven (7) official events will take place across the State during that period.
Datuk Seri Panglima Dr. Joachim Gunsalam, J.P. said that the seven events were a reduction from the 12 held last year and that the budget for the celebrations has also been slashed by 30%.
Dr. Joachim also stressed that the seven events are part of the original traditional 12 being held normally as with the previous years.
The event will culminate with the main one on 21 June 2025 that are the official parade, conferring of awards and state banquet — all are being held every year without fail, regardless of which party is at helm.
This shows that the official birthday celebration for the State Governor does not in any way show that the celebration is done every day but that only seven (7) events are being organized throughout the 3-month period.
Many people including individual and political parties may have misconstrued or did not read the whole story of the news, or worse still, purposely try to twist some of the information reported to the press for purposes only known to them.
Even when the State government has clarified the matter, yet we find some parties trying to hold on to the wrong narrative that the event is being held every day for a long three months!
This beg the question to those people holding on to the wrong narrative:
Will the State leaders celebrate the birthday for 3 long months while neglecting the people of the State?
Absolutely not! And they have been carrying out their duties even during the normal festivals and celebrations.
The seven events to be conducted has courted many criticisms from various parties.
However, little or no criticism or complain is heard about the Harvest Festival being celebrated by the KadazanDusuns throughout the country when some districts celebrate it every week as early as April and the celebration can still be held even in June and July, which are long after the actual Harvest Festival celebration which is on May 30 and 31 every year.
We hope that the people will be wiser by discerning the information being disseminated by the government and not being influenced by other people that try to foster hatred among the people and the government.
They should check the facts and not simply supporting some narratives being hurled by irresponsible parties.
We also hope that people should stop exaggerating the news without any sound information.
