Baram villagers are appalled and angry by the government’s acquisition of their ancestral and native customary rights (NCR) land of 38,322 hectares (or more) for the Baram Hydroelectric dam  development of reservoir site.

Notification of the gazette dated the Dec 22, 2014 was published in Borneo Post on January 8 this year.

According to the gazette notification, the Baram NCR land is acquired by the minister of resource planning and environment under Section 5(3) and (4) of the Code (Cap. 81) of the Sarawak Land Code.

According to the stated land code, the land owners are given 60 days from the date of publication of the gazette to submit their claims for the land and there is no provision for objections.

Gazettes using the same section of the land codes were also used earlier to acquire NCR land in Baram for the access road to the proposed site of the projected Baram dam and the land for dam itself.

Those gazettes have also received strong objections from the people of Baram but preparatory works for the dam started despite the resistance.

For now, however, site works have stopped after blockades by the villagers since October 23, 2013 site works.

In November 2013, a group of villagers from Long Kaseh and Na’ah filed a suit against the same ministry against the extinguishing of rights to their Native Customary Right land.

Anyie Eng and five others from the two villages are challenging the constitutionality   of Section 5(3)  and (4) of the Sarawak land Code. The case is still pending in the High Court.

No EIA report yet

To date, the EIA report (Environmental Impact Assessment) which is mandatory for the project to proceed has yet to be completed.

Commenting on the latest gazette development, lawyer Harrison Ngau, representing Anyie Eng and the five others said: “It is against public policy and law that the minister issues the said directive before the completion of the EIA report.

“In doing so the minister makes a mockery of the environment law, as stated in the Natural Resources and Environment Ordinance,” he said.

He said that a meeting for Baram villagers was called in Miri after the publication of the gazette to get their feedbacks on the extinguishment of their ownership right for lands.

At the meeting there was a unanimous opposition against the gazette. It was agreed that the matter would be referred to court for action, he said.

'All are liars'

Meanwhile, the chairperson of Save Rivers Sarawak, Peter Kallang, said that the Sarawak State Government and Sarawak Energy Bhd have been lying when they claimed that the Murum dam including all (11 to 52) proposed hydroelectric dams in Sarawak were based on recognised international standard like the United Nation Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Equatorial Principles.

“They have been lying all the while. Looking at the dams at Batang Ai, Bakun, Murum and Bengoh, each one has a legacy of problems.

“The state and SEB have no respect for Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) as required by the United Nation Declaration on The Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDP),” he said.

“As it had been done in the existing dams, now it is proven that proposed Baram dam is no

different,” he said, pointing out that the dam proponents are only focused in building the dams.

“They are not interested in the welfare of the people affected or the preservation of environments; they are only interested in building so many dams and give justification for their actions,” he said.