O
n 30 January, 2018 the Sarawak Dewan Undangan Negeri (DUN), or the General Council or the Council Negeri as it was known in the early days celebrated its 150th anniversary. I believe that it is recognised as the oldest DUN in Malaysia, and this adds even more meaning to this celebration.
One of the unique features of our DUN, and one that I am most proud of, is the fact that any of the ethnic languages in Sarawak is allowed to be spoken during the proceedings. This is a reflection of the Sarawak of our forefathers, in which the diverse ethnicity and background of the various communities were widely accepted and respected. No one community was considered to be superior to the rest, and all were treated as equals.
I am aware that some quarters hold the view that the White Rajahs and the British administration were oppressive exploiters of Sarawak and her people. However, it cannot be denied that they put in place a highly efficient and respected civil service and a superior educational system that again did not emphasise the superiority of or the preference for, any particular race or ethnic group. Also, the documents left behind point to an administration that was committed to good governance, justice and fairness. The guiding principles of the Brookes were set out in the nine ‘Cardinal Principles Of The Rule Of The English Rajahs’, and were eventually to become the preamble to the Sarawak Constitution. These principles are timeless and applicable even in this day and age. It is my hope that the members of this august house will continue to be guided by the ideals carried in these 9 principles.
Our celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Sarawak Legislative Assembly is clouded by a prominent and pressing issue, that is the status of the native customary rights (NCR) of the people over their customary land. It is therefore timely to revisit our history in the context of the rights of the people and how these rights were viewed by the government of the time.
In the book ‘Rajahs and Rebels’ by Robert Pringle written in 1970, he discusses the great weight given to the customary law of the people by the government:
‘The customary law (adat) of the various ethnic groups was the third foundation of the Sarawak legal system, the first two being common sense and a vague adherence to English legal principle. Like everything about the Government of Charles Brooke, acceptance of local adat grew quietly and naturally from his early outstation experience, reinforced by the theories of his uncle.’
It was also noted that there was a ‘Native Mohammedan Probate and Divorce Court’ and that although there was no equivalent court for either Chinese or Ibans, the customary law of both was recognized, as interpreted by Native Officers and community headmen, subject to the Resident’s discretion.
In the old days, the customary law was not codified in any written form. It was recognised by a respected author AJN Richards that ‘the customary law is alive and always changing; it lives by the spirit, and not by the letter. If it is put into the straitjacket of statutory form it will perish or, if it lives, it does so by disregarding the statute.’
In this context, the recent Federal Court’s decision in TR Sandah, which ruled that a custom or adat of the people must be codified for it “to have the force of law”, was shocking and unacceptable to the native communities in Sarawak.
True to the prediction of AJN Richards, the NCR of the people are perishing, left in the hands of administrators, legal draftsmen, civil servants and judges who do not understand the customary laws of the people. Even some elected representatives from within and outside this august house have failed our own communities by not defending these rights when the need arose, whether for reasons of personal vested interests and/or political expediency or pure ignorance of these fundamental issues.
In our quest for greater development for the state of Sarawak, such customary rights over land had been trampled upon or ignored by the powers that be, creating unnecessary conflicts and tensions, which have resulted in many injuries and even death. A case in point is the death of Bill Kayong. He died because he dared to speak up for the people. Even in death, he has not been accorded any justice.
In 1915, Charles Brooke at the sitting of the State Assembly warned our forefathers that after his time as the Rajah of Sarawak,
“…others may appear with soft and smiling countenances, to deprive you of what is solemnly your right – and that is, the very land on which you live, the source of your income, the food even of your mouths? If this is lost to you, no amount of money could recover it.
He continued,
“Unless you follow this advice you will lose your birthright, which will be taken from you by strangers and speculators who will in their turn become masters and owners, whilst you yourselves, you people of the soil, will be thrown aside, and become nothing but coolies and outcasts of the island.”
This DUN may have many ‘achievements’ attained over the years; today ministers and elected representatives are congratulating one another while we sit in this building. However, we must not conveniently forget that we are still far behind our Federation partner Malaya in development. For example, over 80% of our schools are classified as dilapidated while over 30% are critically dilapidated.
There is a lack of proper infrastructure, especially road infrastructure. More than 50 years after we formed the federation of Malaysia, the road connectivity in the smaller divisions and rural areas still leaves much to be desired. In Ba’ Kelalan for example, the roads are so badly built that they hardly last a year and turn into soggy mud tracks when it rains. Last week, to attend a Native Court hearing in Kapit, I had to catch a boat from Sibu because the road has not yet been built.
There are not enough hospitals and clinics, especially in the rural areas. At the general hospitals, you will see families of patients from the rural areas camped out in the corridors because they have no place to stay. Many of the rural clinics do not have qualified medical personnel to staff them. Even at the hospitals in towns and cities, there is a lack of medical specialists.
Many villages in the rural areas still depend on generators for electricity. This is especially ironic because we have dams that produce more energy than we need, yet many of our people are not connected to the grid for power. As at the end of 2016, 30% of rural villages still had no access to 24-hour electricity supply. This figure translates to 40,000 homes of 250,000 people, according to a report by Sarawak Energy.
As at March last year only 61% of rural Sarawak had access to treated water, while the remaining 39% representing 114,000 households have to depend on other sources for water.
Every time I touch on the lack of physical development for Sarawak, I am reminded of the statement of the so-called founding father of Malaysia Tunku Abdul Rahman when he said “that one of the principal objectives in the formation of Malaysia was to further the economic development of the Borneo Territories so that their standards of living and technical skills might be raised, and a firm basis provided for accelerated economic growth, … so that the gap between a relatively backward state and the advanced would be narrowed and not widened.”
Sadly, we are not much different from when we first began.
The members of this DUN have the moral responsibility to right a wrong done to the people of Sarawak. Let us mark this 150th anniversary by reflecting on the past, because as someone said, “life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards”. I want to believe that all of us who are sitting in this august house want the best for our beloved State of Sarawak and her people although we come from diverse political backgrounds. On such an auspicious occasion I wish to say on behalf of my other colleagues from the Opposition to pledge to do our best as per our oath of office to speak for and defend the rights of all Malaysians under the Federal and State Constitutions notwithstanding their colour or creed.
On a personal note, I look forward to the amendment of the Sarawak Land Code to recognise and respect the rights of the indigenous people of Sarawak to their customary rights land, which is their life and their livelihood. This will be an achievement, which the Dewan Undangan Negeri can truly be proud of. This will be an act, which will honour our forefathers and what they stood for.
Lastly it is a great disappointment that the present state Government did not consider it appropriate to allocate time for the opposition members to speak on such an auspicious occasion, which is a celebration of all Members and the people of Sarawak. It is an irony when we say that we are celebrating our 150th anniversary of the DUN and as the oldest in the country, yet the BN Government was too immature to allow ‘free speech’ for members of this august house.I look forward to the day when we can truly say that we are a government of the people, for the people and by the people. Baru Bian
