A new land law for the Orang Asli, acknowledged as the country's most marginalised or disadvantaged indigenous group, is being proposed to provide for security of tenure and a tribunal for a final decision on land disputes between the community and the government/private sector.

Centre for Orang Asli Concerns executive director Dr Colin Nicholas told malaysiakini on Wednesday that the Peninsular Malaysia Orang Asli Association, lawyers and concerned citizens are pushing with a draft Act that will be fine-tuned at a workshop expected to be held in December.

After that, they hope it can be taken up by the government to be tabled in Parliament for debate as a new Act or alternatively to be tabled as a Private Member's Bill with provisions to be incorporated as part of the National Land Code.

"The workshop will be open to Orang Asli. There may be a lot of things that they may not agree with and that has to be streamlined," Nicholas said.

Final say

"The proposed bill is solely on the issue of land, mainly security of tenure and not necessarily titles. One of its main features will be the Orang Asli Land Tribunal to handle land disputes."

"The tribunal will comprise various parties, including those from the Orang Asli community and they will have a final say on the land."

Nicholas described the proposed Act as "to a large extent similar to the Malay Reservation Act in providing the necessary protection and what can be done with the land."

However, he added, the difference was the setting-up of the Orang Asli Land Tribunal.

In a paper on "Orang Alsi: First on the Land, Last in the Plan," presented at a Universiti Sains Malaysia's (USM) two-day national seminar in Penang, Nicholas said the Orang Asli are beginning to see the ownership of their traditional lands as "an essential prerequisite for their material and economic upliftment."

He added, however, that "under the present Malaysian laws, the greatest title that the Orang Asli can have to their land is one of tenant-at-will -- an undistinguished allusion to the government's perception that all Orang Asli lands unconditionally belong to the state."

There are provisions made for the gazetting of Orang Asli reserves but the administrative action according to Dr Nicholas, 'does not accord the Orang Asli with any ownership rights over such lands.'

Not full title

The total population of this periphery community, whose numbers are found mainly in the states of Pahang and Perak, is about 135,000 , and it is growing.

According to Nicholas, in 1999 a total of 127,234 hectares of Orang Asli land were given some form of recognition by the government, but not full title.

Of this, 19,507 hectares were gazetted as Orang Asli reserves, while another 29,932 hectares had been approved for gazetting but have yet to be officially gazetted.

Still, another 78,795 hectares have been applied for gazetting and for which no approval had been obtained so far.

He pointed out, however, that these areas are merely those that the government deem to be Orang Asli lands.

"From calculations made based on the Jabatan Hal Ewal Orang Asli's Data Tanah, it was found that the area gazetted represented only 15 per cent of the 799 Orang Asli villages. The remaining villages faced even greater insecurity of tenure over their territories."

Nicholas said of greater concern was that the size of gazetted Orang Asli reserves had in fact declined from 20,667 hectares in 1990 to 19,507.4 hectares in 1999.

Similarly, he added, approval for gazetting had been withdrawn from 7,443.8 hectares of the 36,076 hectares originally approved before 1990.

However, there had been an increase of 11,775 hectares in new applications for gazetted Orang Asli reserves, mainly for new re-group schemes where Orang Asli are to be relocated once their original lands have been taken.

Nicholas said that taken on a per-capita basis, the reserve land allocation works out to 0.15 hectares per Orang Asli. "This figure compares poorly to the same computation for the Malays."

Far behind

With the size of the total Malay Reserve Land being 4.413 million hectares, and with a Malay population of 10.2 million in 1996, the Malay reserve land to population ratio is 0.43 hectare per person. "This is almost triple that for the Orang Asli."

Nicholas said the Orang Asli are definitely far behind the other Malaysians and the reason is not that they are anti-development which they are not.

"On the contrary, the Orang Asli have persistently asked for development - but on their terms," he said.

He pointed out that in fact the Orang Asli have put forward several necessary pre-conditions for their assured development, well-being and progress.

One of this, according to him, is that they want the authorities to recognise Orang Asli traditional land and accord it permanent title.

"Once this is in place, the authorities will be required to treat the Orang Asli as legitimate land-owners and so deal with them accordingly."

The government should also recognise the rights of the Orang Asli to use the forest where they reside, since the courts have already done so.

There should be full and informed participation, including access to information, in all programmes or projects involving the Orang Asli communities concerned before a project is implemented, he added.

Nicholas said the Orang Asli should also be allowed to administer themselves via the Jabatan Hal Ewal Orang Asli (JHEOA) "If necessary, proper training and education should be given so that the goal of an Orang Asli-run is realised."

He also said that Orang Asli like other Malaysian citizens have a right to basic infrastructure such as water supply, electricity, roads, housing, schools and others.

Priority should be given to the provision of these facilities instead of on programmes to change their values and religion.

Nicholas said between 10-15% of Orang Asli are Muslims, 10% Christians and the rest their own religions, but not animism.