Visitors to Kuching: from left, Elam, Ayang and Berembas

While most of the populace in Kuching were still immersed in the festivities of the new millennium, Hari Raya and Chinese New Year, the rueful faces of Berembas Ak Rimo, Ayang Ak Sanai, Elam Ak Busang and Entigar Ak Lajon clearly indicated that they were visitors to the capital of Sarawak.

The three women and young man arrived from Ulu Niah, Miri, some 800km away, on Feb 15 and left the next day. It was the first time for three of them in unfamiliar Kuching, but their mission helped overcome any feeling of uncertainty and anxiety.

The visiting delegation from Rumah Busang and Rumah Bali - two Iban longhouse communities in Ulu Niah - were determined to lobby for support for the early release of their beloved relatives from Lambir Prison in Miri.

Elam's 63-year-old father and headman of Rumah Busang is languishing in the prison together with Ayang's husband Liau, Berembas' son Jambul, Entigar's two brothers Rentap and Emban, and 14 others - 19 villagers in total, charged with the murder of four employees of an oil palm company in a land dispute.

The dispute dates back 20 years when the communities' application for their newly-settled land was turned down by the government. In March 1997, the communities received a letter from the authorities confirming the land as forest reserve.

What was puzzling though was that attached to this was another letter informing them that Sarawak Oil Palm Berhad, a public-listed plantation company owned by the Sarawak State Government, had been given a provisional lease over the same land.

It appeared that the State Land and Survey Department, of which the Sarawak Chief Minister (who is also the Minister of Resource Planning), had given the land to the oil palm company without the knowledge of the two affected communities.

"We applied to the government to give us the land but they refused, saying that it is forest reserve land," Ayang explained. "Yet the company claimed that they obtained titles from the government."

Ayang, visibly anguished, condemned the company for the encroachment and disrupting the simple and peaceful life of the longhouse folk, her family in particular.

"The company is already rich, they don't need this land, I don't understand why they want to rob us of our land. Yet the government sided with the company."

The two communities had been living peacefully, successfully tilling the land, since migrating from the Second Division, Sri Aman, in 1976.

"We have been living here quietly and harmoniously with each other over the past decades. We are content even though we are not rich," Ayang continued.

"We farmed and enjoyed the fruits of our labour without having to work for other people. From the land, we have everything that we need. It is the company that brought chaos to our life. We were living in constant fear that we might lose our farmland and our bilik (room) in the longhouse. We have no where else to go."

Trouble started when thugs allegedly hired by a sub-contractor of Sarawak Palm Oil started threatening the communities with weapons, including samurai swords, in an effort to force them to vacate the land and allow for the planned oil palm plantation.

Recalling their encounter with the intruders, Ayang said that Liau had met the "gangsters" employed by the oil palm estate company in the fields and was also present when this group came into the compound of the longhouse to terrorise and bully villagers.

According to Berembas, "These gangsters had come to intimidate and harass us at the door steps of our longhouses and we didn't fight them. We lodged police reports. If action had been taken, the incident could have been avoided."

A total of seven police reports were lodged by the communities until a fight on Sept 1, 1999, resulted in the death of four personnel of Sarawak Oil Palm.

Entigar, 27, was working in a factory in Nilai, Negeri Sembilan, when he received a phone call telling him that his two brothers Rentap, 31, and Emban, 36, had been arrested by the police for murder.

"I just could not believe it," he recalled. "Our village folk are peace-loving people and we have never had any quarrel or problem with any other longhouse people living in our area. These gangsters employed by the rich oil palm company had been threatening to take away our land for some time. We have never fought back. Instead, we appealed to the government to assist us."

Entigar continued: "When our farmland was bulldozed and our crop destroyed by them, including that of my Emban's, we took no action except to lodge police reports."

Ayang has similar sentiments. "Everybody who knows Liau - not just myself and our children - will not believe that he would commit murder. He makes friends with everybody he meets and we have never seen him quarrel," she said. "He is innocent and I pray that he will return home soon."

Berembas too is certain that Jambol did not commit any offence. "Jambol has never lied to me. When I visited him in the prison, he told me that he and the other villagers acted in self-defence because the gangsters charged at them with samurai swords and other weapons. We have never advocated violence," she said.

"If the oil palm company had not come in to disturb us, our life would have been peaceful and happy. Our village folk live a simple life but we are content.".

Almost everyone in Rumah Busang and Rumah Bali has a family member who has been detained in Lambir Prison. The tragedy is that all those detained are the main breadwinners, resulting in profound hardship for their families.

"My parents were happily enjoying their years of retirement, but now they are forced to work on the farms belonging to Rentap and Emban, together with me, because we must farm so that we have food for the family and an income for the bus fare to visit Rentap and Emban in Lambir Prison," said Berembas a widow who has been living with her sons Jambol, 24, and Geraman, 16.

"When my husband left us, the children were young and we faced difficulties. However, I was younger then and able to work more on the farm. We have been living very happily over the last few years because Jambol has grown up and worked hard to take good care of the family."

"Many young people prefer to leave the longhouse when they grow up, to work in the towns in order to earn more money. Jambol refused to follow them even when his other brothers left. He felt he had the responsibility of taking care of me. Jambol never for a single day left me until he was arrested by the police," said the 52-year-old widow.

"I am back to difficult times again. This time I am older and it is beyond my physical capacity to handle all the responsibilities that I now face. My daughter-in-law is young and she has to take care of two children."

Jambol's mother now has to work on the three-acre padi field and vegetable garden. "I am sure I can endure it until Jambol is released and returns to us," she said bravely.

"We are facing grave financial difficulty," Ayang said. "The farm gives us barely sufficient food, and we need money for Lyn's schooling, the bus fare to Lambir Prison to visit Liau and the other household expenses." But her husband, whom she tries to visit once a fortnight, is concerned that Lyn attends school regularly.

In a few cases, children have been forced to stop schooling because their families could no longer afford it and they had to help on the farm.

With the detention of Liau, Ayang has had to shoulder his tasks in addition her own. Robert, their eldest son, works in a factory in Johor and tries his best to send part of his wages back to support the family, but his wages are minimal.

"We are lucky to have support from our friends and relatives," Ayang said. "But I am trying to plant more vegetables for sale so that we have a little more income for me to continue to afford the bus fare to Lambir Prison."

The shortage of hands has restricted current work to farms of manageable size; larger tracts of land, some cultivated with crops, have been abandoned, and there is grave concern that the harvest and income of the two longhouse communities will be adversely affected by the continuing detention of the 19 villagers.

The case was transferred to the High Court in Dec 1999 but no date has been set for the trial. In the meantime, the delegation of four family members, encouraged by the public support in Kuching, have taken their mission to other towns in Sarawak.

"We don't know when the trial is yet, but we hope that it will be soon and our relatives and friends will soon be returning to our longhouses," Entigar said.

CHENDANG HOLLIS is a freelance writer based in Sarawak. For more information on the above story, visit http://www.rengah.c2o.org