Rights groups say stateless people in the country are often treated as undocumented migrants without basic protections
2-MIN READ2-MIN ListenUshar DanielePublished: 7:49pm, 16 Mar 2026The 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.
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.
