Donald Stephens founded the political party
United National Kadazan Organisation (UNKO) in August 1961. He played a key role in negotiating the independence of Sabah and the formation of Malaysia, together with
Tun Mustapha of
United Sabah National Organisation (USNO),
Lee Kuan Yew of
Singapore and
Tunku Abdul Rahman, the then
Prime Minister of Malaya. The formation of Malaysia was finally achieved on 16 September 1963, which is today known as
Malaysia Day. He became Sabah's first Chief Minister as UNKO together with USNO and
Sabah Chinese Association (SCA) formed the Sabah Alliance coalition to rule the new
Government of Sabah. In 1964, Donald Stephens stepped down as Chief Minister to become the first Malaysian federal
cabinet member from Sabah. He was replaced by
Peter Lo Sui Yin of SCA. Stephens became the minister in charge of Sabah affairs under the Prime Minister's department. Stephens saw Malaysia as the federation of four countries - Malaya, Sabah, Sarawak and Singapore - as equal partners, as opposed to the eleven states making up the
Federation of Malaya, which had less autonomy. Following Singapore's exit from Malaysia, Stephens sought a review of Sabah's participation in the federation, although he was not seeking secession. However, this was rejected by the federal government, which feared that such a move would endanger the federation as a whole. In 1973, Fuad Stephens was appointed as the governor of Sabah, known as the
Yang di-Pertua Negara (the post was later downgraded after 1976 to
Yang di-Pertua Negeri). He held this position until 1975. Later that same year, Tun Fuad Stephens together with
Harris Salleh formed the new political party
Sabah People's United Front (BERJAYA). They won the 1976 state election, defeating Tun Mustapha's USNO and becoming the new government of Sabah. Tun Fuad Stephens became Sabah's fifth Chief Minister. Forty-four days later, he died in a plane crash. == Plane crash ==