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Extracted
from Malaysiakini
Still labourers, not
landowners after 35 years
Feb 22,
About 70 Iban families
who were resettled from the
Village chief Nelson
Janggai anak Sulau said that, in 1963, the state government ordered over 400
families from two villages to be resettled closer to Miri for security reasons,
due to border clashes.
Residents of Lobang Baya and Nanga Jambu Delok in Lubok
Antu agreed to move after being told about the necessity to resettle them to a
safer place with easy accessibility.
He said the Sarawak Finance Development Corporation (SFDC),
which undertook the resettlement, offered each settler a 0.6ha village lot at
the Kampung Penempatan Bukit Peninjau oil palm scheme about 50km south of Miri.
“It has been 35 years. Instead of being owners, we’re now
only labourers,” he told malaysiakini during a recent visit to
He claimed that the Sarawak Land Development Board (LKTS)
has since sold the scheme, inclusive of the village and the oil palm
plantation, to the Sarawak Plantation Agriculture Development (SPAD).
Malaysiakini has not been able to reach officials at the
relevant agencies for comment since yesterday.
‘Fulfil promise’
According to Nelson, the state Lands and Surveys
Superintendent granted a provisional 60-year lease in May 1983 to LKTS for
2,162 hectares of land at nearby Bukit Kisi with a premium of more than
RM16,000 and an annual rent of RM5,343.
“Our agreement was with (then) SFDC but the whole scheme
has now been taken over by the LKTS and sold off to the SPAD,” he said.
“Instead of being land owners, we’re paid RM8 daily wage or
about RM200 a month. How are our families to survive with school-going
children? We want the government to revert to the 1970 resettlement agreement
and fulfil it.”
He said the villagers had attempted to stop the replanting
of oil palm ever since the SPAD took over management of the scheme, but failed.
When resettlement began
in stages in 1970, he said, the government promised to allocate a four-hectare
plot to each settler and issue titles after 12 years.
“But most have left the scheme after becoming confused with
what was happening within the state agencies. Some were even given temporary
housing by the LKTS and made to sign a separate agreement,” he claimed, adding
that his villagers had told him this.
According to the explanatory notes attached to an official
circular dated Feb 9,1970 issued by the state development officer on the
selection of settlers, land titles would not be issued until “total development
cost are recovered”.
However, the settlers could occupy Kampung Bukit Peninjau “in anticipation of titles
and will be encouraged to cultivate (the land) themselves in their free time”.
A compensation scheme would be available in cases where
settlers have to be removed but “only after the land has been fully developed”,
estimated to be four to five years later.
As a means of survival, said Nelson, the remaining
villagers have cultivated neighbouring state land, using this for orchards,
vegetable farms and banana plantations.
“We want the state government gives us the two plots in
replacement of ancestral land that we lost during resettlement.”
However, the Miri district Lands and Surveys Superintendent
issued a letter on
“We want what is rightfully ours, that is, we want an
equivalent site near our present village to replace the ancestral land we lost
during the resettlement,” Nelson added.
