The Malaysian Insight

THERE is now light at the end of the tunnel, said indigenous tribe leader Yusri Ahon, talking about the future of Malaysia’s first inhabitants on the country’s 62nd Merdeka.

But the tunnel’s end is still a ways away as the Pakatan Harapan government struggles to make a lasting, positive impact on the Orang Asal – the term used for all Sabah, Sarawak and peninsula indigenous tribes.

Compared with the Barisan Nasional regime of the past six decades, said Yusri, PH has a more positive attitude towards tribes’ right to claim customary land and traditional way of life.

For instance, the attorney-general has taken the extraordinary step of suing Kelantan on behalf of a tribe to compel the state to respect the community’s land claims.

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department P. Waytha Moorthy, meanwhile, has announced that Putrajaya will recognise Orang Asal traditions and religions – something that Yusri believes is a key step towards better protection of their rights.

The shift in attitude, however, has yet to produce wide-scale changes in the lives of tribespeople nationwide as hoped by many, said indigenous rights leaders and activists.

The events of the past few days and months reflect the obstacles that the federal government has to overcome to better the Orang Asal’s lives.

Three days ago, the pick-up trucks and vans that thousands of indigenous children depend on to take them to school stopped running. Operators of the service said this was because the PH administration had not paid them since March.

In Sarawak, the Iban are still fighting to prevent loggers and oil palm planters from stealing their ancestral land.

And, cases concerning native customary rights (NCR) claims are piling up at Sabah courts.

Sabah activist Galus Ahtoi, of Pacos Trust, said this is happening despite the state having the country’s best laws on tribal land, and its government has as office-holders two world-renowned native rights champions.

Meanwhile, Sarawak Dayak Iban Association secretary-general Nicholas Mujah said he is giving the PH administration the benefit of the doubt when it comes to its commitment to native rights.

“We know the government has its limitations,” he said, referring to the fact that under the federal constitution, the management of land falls under state governments, restricting the reach of Putrajaya’s policies on the matter.

“But even in areas within its jurisdiction, such as agriculture and plantation, the government has not done well to change native lives for the better.”

Implementation failures

Indigenous folk make up some 13.8% of the Malaysian population, and are concentrated in Sabah and Sarawak.

According to a recent United Nations report, they are among the country’s most vulnerable and poorest.

Report author UN special rapporteur Professor Philip Alston described the attitude of some government officials towards the Orang Asal as “abysmal”.

He said such officials are not much different from the 19th-century colonialists who subjugated Australia’s Aborigines.

Although elected politicians in the PH government have the correct attitude, it has yet to trickle down to the civil service.

The Parti Warisan Sabah-led state government has Jannie Lasimbang, a policymaker in the Sabah cabinet, and her brother, Adrian Lasimbang, who is a senator. Both have fought for native land rights and welfare all their lives.

Sabah also has the best laws for tribes to claim ancestral land, said Ahtoi.

“Land claims can be decided at the district level by the Land Revenue Collection Department. The problem is that the department’s officials are not sensitive about native land rights.”

Villagers who fail to get their claims recognised by the department will have to take them up at a special court, but the steep legal fees make it difficult for poor tribespeople.

“There seems to be no political will to train these officers to be sensitive to the community’s needs. The politicians may be good, but the implementers are bad. The laws are good, but they remain so only in books,” said Ahtoi.

Although PH’s overall approach to NCR is progressive, its other policies are diluting the very same rights.

Mujah said villagers are still fighting off logging and plantation companies that trespass on and steal their land with seeming impunity.

This can be stopped if the Primary Industries Ministry rules that palm oil firms must respect tribal land or risk getting shut down, he said.

“Land matters may fall under the state, but palm oil and rubber come under the federal government. So, Putrajaya can do their part to ensure our rights are respected.”

Despite these shortcomings, Yusri, who is part of the Peninsula Orang Asli network, remains hopeful that the PH administration will one day live up to its promises to the community.

“Looking at what they’ve done in Kelantan and Perak, it gives me hope,” he said, referring to how Putrajaya’s actions have temporarily halted loggers, who were destroying Orang Asal land in the two states.

“The BN government never respected or accepted our demands for customary land.”

Equally important is that PH, unlike BN, appears to listen to what the Orang Asal want, rather than imposing on the community what the government thinks is best.

Yusri said PH accepts the fact that to uplift the Orang Asal, they must be allowed to remain in their forests and continue living the way their ancestors did.

“BN’s schemes… to resettle Orang Asal communities in cities or plantations have failed. The inhabitants of these projects often end up going back to the forest.

“Out of all the Orang Asal, only 10% to 20% can adapt to modern life. The rest still need to live in their traditional way to do well.” – August 31, 2019.