Some 400 Dusun transmigrants from Kiulu in the northwest, who entered Beaufort along the west coast nearly four decades ago to work “new land”, are currently engaged in a tussle for some 300 acres which is also being claimed by the nearby privately-owned Woodford Rubber Estate which has other land totalling 8,000 acres within the same vicinity.

simon sipaun 02 “The land in dispute – in two patches -- is reportedly being claimed by a former chief minister but ownership has apparently been vested in a private company called Prosper Lane Sdn Bhd,” said Suhakam (Malaysian Human Rights Commission) vice-chairman Simon Sipaun who hopes that someone will be allowed to play the role of peacemaker between the contending parties.

“Usually, the problem arises because the government does not define the areas known as kampung reserve i.e. areas on state land occupied by kampungs. But this is not the problem in this case.”

He suggests that the government compulsorily acquire the 300 acres from the company claiming the land since the authorities have over the years provided the kampung - seven minutes from the Beaufort-Kota Kinabalu Highway - with road access, a concrete bridge, a balai raya, a church, electricity and water, among other facilities.

Sipaun sees “no reason why the company cannot concentrate on their other land and insists on picking on the poor folks in the kampung”.

“Our Suhakam team has visited the kampung and feel that they have a case which the government should consider seriously,” said Sipaun. “Many of the kampung houses are permanent concrete structures.”

Prosper Lane wants to take back land

Prosper Lane Sdn Bhd, the owner of the disputed land – titled as CL (Country Lease) 175346666 – wants the state government to move the “squatters off their private property” to state land. The company said the government has plenty of state land and said it “will oppose any attempts to acquire the said land”.

“Our stand (to take back the land) remains,” said Prosper Lane managing director Abdul Aziz Tengah. “There are other (state) land in the area where they can be re-settled.”

He cited 4,557 acres in Mawao, 3,655 acres in Kilas, 1,000 acres in Klias Peri, 1,497 acres in Menumbuk and 4,394 acres in Lumadan.

mount kinabalu sabah 030209 03 In addition, he cited 2,000 acres of state-owned land which was reserved for cashew nut projects by the Korperasi Pembangunan Desa (KBD) but “were instead alienated to individuals by the PBS (Parti Bersatu Sabah) government.”

“The government should take back the 2,000 acres from the individuals concerned and give that to the people of Kampung Klias Baru Lumat and others in the Bongawan area,” said Abdul Aziz.

“There are so many state land in the area which were alienated by the PBS government to individuals. The government should have given 15 acres each to the squatters now occupying our land but this was not done.”

He claims that the 400 affected Dusun settlers did not move on their own to the land the company now claims but were in fact re-settled there by the PBS Government “when in fact there already was 906,330 acres reserved by the government for smallholders”.

“We once again urge the government to re-settle these squatters on the land reserved for them in 1985,” added Abdul Aziz.

Villagers claim they are on state land

It was not immediately clear whether the land reservation referred to by Abdul Aziz was done by the Berjaya government or PBS which crushed the former in 1985 but called for polls again within a year in 1986 to bolster its slender majority vis-à-vis the opposition Usno (United Sabah National Organisation) of famed Suluk freedom fighter Datu Mustapha Datu Harun.

Re-settlement is easier said than done since the 400 folks of the “disputed” Woodford land which their Kampung Kiulu Baru Lumat (KB) occupies are insisting that what they worked on since 1973 is actually state land to which they are claiming native customary rights (NCR).

They deny being re-settled on the disputed land by the PBS government and cite the graveyards in the kampung as evidence of their claim.

In defence of their NCR claim, they point out that they actually cleared forest land, not estate land, to build houses and plant padi, rubber, fruit trees, reared buffaloes and built fish ponds, all of which have become “a source of income and subsistence for their families”.

According to government records, the people of Kampung Klias Baru Lumat applied to the Lands and Surveys Department (LSD) for the land occupied by them to be gazetted as “tanah kampung” (kampung land) and subsequently, they were given a LSD plan marking 400 acres as Lumat Kampung Reserve.

“Are we going to be refugees in our own land,” asked two residents of KB who gave their names as Fedelis Molondoi, 30, and Alex Salimat, 33, both among a representative group of ten kampung folks who visited the Suhakam office in Kota Kinabalu in recent days.

“Where are we and our families going to go if we are forced to get out of the kampung?”

The duo pointed out that already some of them have been forced to work outside the kampung following the drop in the rubber price from RM5.70 per kilo to about RM2 per kilo now.

Bulldozers knock down rubber trees

Matters were further compounded for others when the claimant company’s tractors recently started bulldozing their way through their land planted with rubber trees and many of the trees were felled, depriving them of one source of income.

The bulldozing came to a halt after the Assistant Collector of Land Revenue, Beaufort, stepped in and persuaded the company to put off the eviction order which actually expired on Feb 4 this year.

Two “government representatives”, claim kampung folks, visited them before the General Elections on March 8 last year and advised them to stay put on the land and promised them that the matter would be sorted out soon.

Molondoi and Salimat claim that the company once offered to “sell” the disputed 300 acres back to the government “but the offer was not taken up”.

“Now, they are not willing to sell the land because they plan to plant teak and gaharu trees,” said Molondoi, citing what company representatives have since told the kampung folks.

Abdul Aziz has confirmed in a local business release that Prosper Lane has entered into an agreement with a United Kingdom company to plant teak and gaharu on the company’s land at the rate of 80 acres a month starting from July this year.

“We are not willing to wait longer than Dec 31 this year,” confirmed Abdul Aziz in the local media on April 1, indicating a softening of the company’s position on the issue of “squatters occupying company land”.

Many complaints on the land issue problem

Sipaun fears that the affected residents may be crying over spilt milk in their present predicament and “if push comes to shove, we hope that Safoda (Sabah Forestry Development Authority) will allow some or all of them to settle on land which it has nearby.”

“We have talked to them (Safoda) but they are only willing to part with 100 acres for the kampung folks,” confirmed Sipaun. “This can only take some of the affected people. Where will the rest go?”

Safoda has some 3,000 acres in the area situated about 1.5 km from Woodford, according to Sipaun.

Some of the affected kampung people polled by Suhakam are willing to move out of Klias Baru Lumat provided “the government compensates them for their efforts so far and provide alternative flood-free land suitable for agriculture and facilities for a decent living”.

Cash (Consumers Association of Sabah and Labuan) president Patrick Sindu, meanwhile, is calling for the revamp of the Lands and Surveys Department and the establishment of a Land Tribunal in Sabah to adjudicate on competing land claims.

“There’s something not quite right when folks who have been occupying and working land for generations are not given preference over companies applying for land,” said Sindu. “We have received so many complaints on the land issue problem and they are all similar ... the people vs companies looking for land.”

“If the illegals who occupied Pulau Gaya – off the waters of Kota Kinabalu – can be resettled in Telipok, there’s no reason why local people cannot be afforded the same consideration by the state government,” said Sindu on the predicament of the 400 Dusun settlers in Beaufort.

The “illegals” referred to by Sindu have always disputed the tag and claim that they have MyKads issued properly by the State NRD (National Registration Department). However, they have admitted that they are not originally from Pulau Gaya but land-seekers from various other parts of Sabah.