Sabah Divers

The 2015 Malaysian Census reported the population of Sabah at 3,543,500, being the third most populous state in Malaysia and have the highest non-citizens population at 870,400. However, as Malaysia is one of the least densely populated countries in Asia, Sabah is particularly sparsely populated with most of the population concentrated in the coastal areas since towns and urban centres have massively expanded. The statistics in 1970 reported the population of Sabah with only 653,600, with both the state and its neighbour of Sarawak has about the same number of foreign nationals. By 1980, the state population saw a sudden increase to over 1,011,000 following the influx of refugees who fleeing a conflict in the neighbouring southern Philippines. At the same time, Sabah economic booms in the primary sector also attracted large legal workers from both Indonesia and the Philippines. This increase to over 1,863,600 in 1991, 2,603,485 in 2000, and by 2010 turned into 3,117,405. Sabah has 900,000 registered migrant workers working in agriculture, plantation, construction, services and domestic workers. While the total number of illegal immigrants are predicted to be as more than one million due to the past controversial regularisation for political reasons, with most of them are believed to have been categorised as other bumiputera category group in the country statistics. Sabah also seen a great increase in the number of expatriates, with most of them comes from China, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Australia and Europe. People from Sabah are generally called Sabahans and identify themselves as such. There is an estimate of 42 ethnic groups with over 200 sub-ethnic groups with their own language, culture and beliefs which predicted to be increase more in the future due to high interracial marriage and recent migration. The coastal and low land areas are inhabited mostly by Bajau, Bruneian Malay, Bugis, Cocos Malays, Illanun, Kedayan and Suluk who are traditionally working as fishermen and farmers. While high land areas and interior are inhabited mostly by the Kadazan-Dusun peoples, Murut, Lun Bawang/Lun Dayeh and their sub-groups as farmers and hunters. Bumiputera refers to the Malays and other indigenous groups in Peninsular Malaysia, Sarawak and Sabah. This group of people generally enjoy special privileges in education, jobs, finance and political positions. Orang Asal refers to all the indigenous groups in Malaysia excluding Malays.The three largest indigenous group in Sabah are the Kadazan-Dusun, Bajau and Murut; followed by the Bruneian Malays, Suluk and other indigenous, while the Chinese makes up the main non-indigenous population.
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