It is their school set up by a devoted teacher.

Similar buildings have been demolished by the authorities. But they are never deterred, and continue rebuilding the schools, sometimes in a neighbour’s backyard down the road.

Stateless children, most of them of Filipino descent but born in Sabah, have been denied their basic right to education due to the absence of proper identification documents.

Sandakan native Putri Purnama Sugua, 25, who recently documented the issue, grew up with many stateless kids.

She found it strange that they didn’t go to the same school as her.

“It breaks my heart when I see how passionate these kids are to get an education. They don’t have anything else. They struggle, but even then, they want to go to school.

“School is cheap here. You usually pay 50 sen a day, but this is not easy for most of the stateless kids. They’re hungry for knowledge, and they want to make it out in the real world.

“It’s horrible that they come to realise so early on in life that they can’t go anywhere without that one document that everyone else has, and it’s not fair.”

Statelessness is a common issue faced by many in Sabah, most of whom are of Filipino and Indonesian descent, as well as many members of tribes in the state.

Under state laws, being born in Sabah or Sarawak does not automatically make a person a permanent resident or citizen, unless one of their parents is a Malaysian.

According to Putri, most of the stateless children in her village in Sandakan are third or fourth generation Malaysians, whose parents and grandparents were born in Malaysia, but simply had no papers.

She said most of their forefathers had migrated to escape colonial rule.

Stateless children and teenagers caught by the immigration are detained and deported back to their “home country” for violating the law, despite having been brought up in Malaysia their whole life.

“But where are they going to go? They don’t have anyone outside of Sabah,” Putri told FMT in an interview recently.

“They have no certification, they have no family there, so what do they do? They take to crime to make some small cash.

“This is why so many stateless people end up committing crimes. For them, it’s just the way of life. They’ve never been told it’s wrong. What other choice do they have? How else are they going to eat?”

The stateless community, said to be numbering some 800,000, live in remote parts of the state, and are always on the lookout.

Putri said she has personally witnessed immigration authorities coming to her village and arresting the stateless community, who take to working at dumpsites and doing odd jobs to make ends meet.

On some occasions, their houses were burned down.

When Putri returned to Sandakan after completing her degree, she could not locate any of the stateless children she grew up with.

“I don’t know where they are anymore. Their parents are gone too. They must have been arrested,” she said.

She explained how a stateless friend of hers, whose parents were arrested after their house was burnt down, nearly lost their sanity, and ended up living on the streets, begging and grovelling for a drink or a meal.

“What were we expecting when we do things like this?” she asked, accusing the authorities of lacking human compassion.

For Putri, Sabah has a long way to go before it can champion itself as a state that takes care of its people.

She said the state can start by recognising the rights of the stateless children.

“If they don’t go to school, they’ll end up working at dumpsites like their parents, or working in malls and as cashiers, always ready to run away if they meet an immigration officer.

“Is that the life we want for them? How does this help you?”

She said most stateless people could barely earn a decent living, let alone travel to the nearest immigration office and pay for the appeal process to get a permanent residency, which could cost several thousand ringgit.

Many simply stay in their villages, hoping that one day they would no longer be considered a threat.

Most of the stateless children in Sabah today work in palm oil plantations, or in the construction and fishing industries.

Putri said many in Sabah were happy that its new chief minister said he would focus on solving the issues faced by the stateless community, compared to the lax attitude of its previous officials.

She said many from West Malaysia have no idea about these issues.

Putri, who studied theatre and animation in UiTM, has documented the issue in her film “Aku Mau Skola”, which debuts on Sept 29 at the PJ Live Arts, Jaya One in Petaling Jaya.

This is her second film documenting the issues plaguing the stateless community in her hometown.

The film is featured in the FreedomFilmFest, an annual human rights documentary film festival which runs from Sept 29 to Oct 6. Tickets are available on the festival’s website.