Arrest of stateless teen in Malaysia highlights plight of Sabah’s 1 million non-citizens

2026.03.16 11:50 People walk past a mural in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. Photo: Tamara Hinson The arrest of a 17-year-old stateless teenager during a school outing to buy Eid clothes at a Sabah mall for allegedly failing to show valid residence papers, has returned scrutiny to Malaysia’s treatment of undocumented people. Niko Ansboy, a student at Borneo Komrad, an alternative school for stateless children, was waiting outside a store during a school trip to the 1Borneo Hypermall when police detained him on Sunday. He was stopped by officers patrolling after the Kota Kinabalu District Police Headquarters received reports of a spate of thefts. Acting Kota Kinabalu police chief Superintendent Syed Lot Syed Ab Rahman confirmed the arrest, saying Niko was detained “for further action … for being in Malaysia without valid travel documents”. The teenager was yet to be released on Monday. Niko Ansboy is a student at Borneo Komrad, an alternative school for stateless children. Photo: Handout According to official government data, Sabah is home to more than 1 million non-citizens – including stateless and undocumented residents denied legal status by Malaysia’s restrictive citizenship laws, even for those born and raised in the country. Given that the state has a population of about 3.7 million, this means roughly one in three residents are non-citizens. Sabah has the highest non-citizen population of all Malaysian states, spurred in part by decades of migration from Indonesia and the southern Philippines. The state is one of Malaysia’s poorest and those in rural areas are often unable to travel to official registration centres due to the distance, costs and other bureaucratic hurdles, leaving many without formal identification. Rights groups say stateless people are often treated as undocumented migrants, stripped of basic protections and living with the constant threat of arrest and detention. Niko’s teacher, Sabir Syarifuddin, said the boy had finished his shopping and was waiti

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