1. Background of People’s Service Organisation (PSO)
PSO, its objectives and activities carried out
The PSO was initiated by the worker leaders of the Batang Berjuntai area, now known as Bestari Jaya. PSO was subsequently registered under Societies Act of Malaysia in 1984. Its primary objective is to create awareness and provide various services to the people on matters which affects their lives.
Thus for the past 25 plus years PSO was able to address and solve issues related to the social, economic, cultural and educational problems faced by the people. Addressing workers rights, women’s rights, consumer’s rights, children’s rights, youth rights and farmers rights were given priority. Under the workers rights, ownership of home and land became an important area of work for PSO.
2. PSO’s involvement on estate workers home and land-related issues
Minimum Standard Housing Act for estate workers - 1966
The history of PSO’s involvement on the housing issues of workers started with its involvement in educating workers to understand the Minimum Standard Housing Act 1966 for estate workers and look into its implementation. Thus estate owners were forced to undertake activities to improve the housing conditions and its surroundings based on standards set by the act.
Through this, many estates improved the conditions of the toilets, water taps, measurements of kitchen, sleeping rooms, cleanliness of the drains, grass cutting, day care, dispensaries, etc, etc. Small companies and fragmented estates did not comply with those standards.
Estate and tin mine workers own housing scheme - 1974
The late prime minister Abdul Razak Hussein introduced the above Workers Own Housing Scheme where a three-party participation was initiated, ie workers themselves, management and state governments. The government set aside a RM100 million special fund for its implementation.
The first and second projects in Batu Pekaka Estate in Kedah used RM5,000.00, and a second project in Dowanby Estate in Perak used RM7,500.00. But in the third project in Tennamaran Estate, Selangor, RM11,500 was used of which the workers themselves contributed RM3,000.00 which was deducted from the salary of workers by the estate management (RM50 per month .
The other projects in Sungai Buloh Estate and Glemmary Estate did not use the special fund and the workers were availed a loan of RM25,000.00 from the commercial banks. The Kamasan and Raja Musa Estate Workers housing scheme was also implemented through bank loans. The PSO got involved in the Tennamaram, Sungai Buloh and Glemmary Estate workers Own Housing Schemes.
While helping the workers to understand the agreements they were signing with the estate managements and the banks, PSO also questioned on what happened to the RM100 million special fund allocated under the Third Malaysia Plan to implement these schemes. We noted that only three schemes (Batu Bekaka, Dowanby and Tennamaram used the special fund. But all other projects were availed loans from banks .
PSO also jointly organised and actively participated in a one-day seminar on the need for homes for the estate workers organized by Tholilalar Tholan. The seminar was held in Kuala Lumpur, where estate worker leaders from Selangor and Perak participated.
When the Pakatan-led Selangor state government, after winning the state in the 2008 general election, urged a workshop on the present status of the above workers own housing scheme, PSO actively participated in that workshop by sharing its experiences on the implementation of the above scheme. We also agreed to work with ‘Jerit’ to look into the promotion of this project where the management of the companies were in agreement.
Issues of workers who occupied Temporary Occupant Land (TOL)
As workers started to leave the estates for many reasons, quite a number of them started to occupy TOL land in and around the Batang Berjuntai area. PSO did some work on the Hopefull area, Nigal Gardner areas, Batu Pecak area and Java Selangor area and forwarded their issues to the relevant authorities on matters relating to the obtaining of white cards, and encroachment of their land by others.
PSO organised a special workshop by inviting people affected by TOL issues and forwarded all the complaints to the councillors of the Kuala Selangor district office .
Sale of estates and the need for homes or land
PSO later on started to organise workers in Bukit Tagar estate, Nigal Gardner estate, Mary Estate, Sungai Tinggi estate and Minyak Factory who faced a totally new situation, ie when their estates owned by Socfin Company were sold to Berjaya company. Socfin sold 11,500ha of land for RM650 million to Berjaya, who later sold potions of the estate land to developers of projects.
Thus PSO felt that the workers should be properly compensated. PSO, through its legal aid services, was able to work out a good compensation for the workers by filing the cases with the Labour Court.
After getting a better compensation the workers, another campaign was initiated, ie to own homes or the Berjaya company to provide a piece of land for the workers where they will build their own homes later on. This was initiated when Berjaya started to undertake massive development projects on the land they bought from Socfin.
The workers invited their political representatives to discuss this matter . During those meetings the following politicians made these promises:
YB G Palanivel, then Member of Parliament for Hulu Selangor, promised that he will speak to Vincent Tan, who owned the Berjaya, to get the company to provide homes for the workers in the housing schemes Berjaya will develop. He promised that he will get the keys for the homes soon.
The late YB K Sivalingam, then a Selangor state exco member, also promised that he will get the Selangor state government to build homes for the workers or provide a piece of land adjourning those estates where the workers could build their homes later on.
Former Selangor menteri besar YB Khir Toyo, together with YB Noh Omar, the MP for Tanjung Karang, also made a promise to the estate workers that the state will build homes for the estate workers if the workers will help the BN win the 2008 election.
3. Continued activities of PSO with Selangor state government under Pakatan rule
a) After the 2008 election
Pakatan during its 2008 election campaign promised workers that they will look into building homes for the workers or providing land to build homes and carry out agriculture and settle all issues related to occupation of TOL land.
PSO once again organised the estate workers to continuously put forward their demands to the newly elected Pakatan-led Selangor state government.
PSO and worker leaders met a couple of times in their own estates and made a decision to approach Dr Xavier Jayakumar, who was then the exco member to represent estate workers in the Selangor state government. Dr Xavier did his level best to entertain the request of the workers by attending all the meetings organised by PSO and worker leaders. He also tried to persuade strategic people to help to implement the home scheme for estate workers.
Feb 18, 2009 - Dr Xavier Jayakumar met all the estate worker leaders from Berjaya together with NUPW representatives at the Kuala Selangor District Office to discuss this matter .
Feb 27, 2009 - Selangor NUPW wrote a letter to Vincent Tan regarding the housing scheme for workers.
April 17, 2009 - Dr Xavier Jayakumar wrote a letter to Vincent Tan regarding the housing scheme for the workers.
April 24, 2009 - Dr Xavier Jayakumar, with the estate worker leaders, visited the Raja Musa and Berjuntai Tin Mines area, with maps, to locate available land to be made available for estate workers. Another area which was suggested by the workers was near Sungai Tinggi Estate.
This process which was undertaken by Dr Xavier Jayakumar came to a halt as Pakatan began to get ready for the general election 2013 .
4. Dialogue with YB Kanabathi Rao
After the 2013 GE YB Kanabathi Rao was made the state exco member to deal with all matters related to estate workers in Selangor. Three main leaders of PSO met YB Kanabathi Rao to discuss the workers housing issue. We were informed that there is no file at all in the exco office regarding the above matter. The YB also informed us no concrete plans have been set by the state government on this matter .
Finally we gave a verbal report to YB on what happened so far, especially the attempts made by Dr Xavier Jayakumar, regarding this matter. We also provided all our correspondence with the state exco office.
Finally we issued a letter dated Oct 1, 2013 to YB Kanabathi Rao which contained the workers demand to the Selangor state government to implement either one of the following:
- To build ‘low-cost houses’ for workers,
- To build ‘Rumah Mesra Rakyat’ for workers,
- To provide land for the workers so that they can build their homes later on.
Following that meeting on Sept 26, 2013 there has been no positive response from YB Kanabathi Rao.
5. Visit of YB P Waythamoorthy and YB Kanapathi Rao to Nigal Gardner Estate and Bukit Tagar respectively
- YB Waythamoorthy, Minister without portfolio in the PM’s Department, visited Nigal Gardner Estate. The manager of the estate informed the YB that there is no housing scheme project to be implemented for the estate workers in Berjaya.
- YB Kanabathi Rao’s visit to Nigal Gardner Estate did not take place.
6. The long period of stagnation on this issues
With all the above attempts made by PSO and worker leaders on this matter, nothing concrete has happened so far. But meanwhile, the PSO started to hear stories which cannot be proven so far. They are :-
- No TOL land will to given to people who are living on these lands,
- About 750ha of land is being given out for development purpose,
- Another 3,000ha of land is being developed to put up factories.
7. Our demand
At this juncture when all the avenues regarding the above matter have come to a halt, PSO and the worker leaders have finally decided to organise a press conference to highlight the ongoing plight of the estate workers, not only in Kuala Selangor district but also throughout Selangor.
The PSO also invited Jerit, an NGO which has been helping estate workers in other parts of Selangor on land and home related issues of the estate workers, to join us in this press conference.
Our demands are:
Based on the promises Selangor state government made during the 2008 and 2013 elections that:
1) The Selangor state government must build affordable homes for the estate workers
or
2) To provide lands for the workers so that they can build their homes in the future
3) The Selangor state government should have a serious meeting as soon as possible with all worker representatives from the estates and Berjaya management to seek a resolution to work out the on-going housing issue.
At the same time we also request the Selangor state government to give correct information on the following matters since it has adopted a ‘Right to Information Act’.
- Statistics on the number of homeless people in Selangor in general and Indian community in particular and what are the plans to build affordable homes for the poor and needy, since the prices of homes are so high the poor can’t effort to buy those houses.
- Information on all types of socio-economic projects implemented by the state government to uplift the poor and needy in general and the Indian community in particular. The amount allocated for this purpose and how much have been spent and what is the balance available.
