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Extracted from Malaysian Today
Date: 16 August 2001
NCR claimants to know fate Aug 30
By Churchill Edward
KUCHING: The High Court here will give its decision on August 30 whether five Native Customary Rights (NCR) claimants have any cause of action against an oil palm company which claims to have provisional lease over a disputed land.
The company, Tetangga Akrab Sdn. Bhd. in its application to strike off the NCR claimants' civil suit yesterday, claimed that they (claimants) had no cause of action as they (claimants) had no rights over the disputed land.
Tetangga Akrab claimed that the Government had gazetted the disputed land -Plaman Engkaroh near Serian - a protected forest in 1959.
However, the five claimants - Ridi Jamil, Apit Kundi, Kaja Sanggong, Gilen Betok and Billy Labon - who represented villagers residing around Plaman Engkaroh claimed otherwise.
They also claimed that they had never been given any proper notice of extinguishment of their NCR rights by the authority.
The villagers filed the civil suit action against the developer for encroaching into the disputed land only last month.
The civil suit action also named the State Government as the Second Defendant.
High Court Deputy Registrar, Azahari Kamal Ramli presided over the case.
Harrison Ngau represented the villagers, while William Chang represented Tetangga Akrab.
The State Government was represented by Susan Gau on behalf of the State Attorney General.