Sarawak became an autonomous state of the federation of Malaysia on 16 September 1963. Since this time, logging has depleted 90% of Sarawak’s old growth forest ( >10 Ma ).
Area of Conflict: The Sarawak state of Malaysia on the island of Borneo in Southeast Asia Population: 2.4 M (2006) Area: 124,450 km^2
Ethnic majority: none
>40 ethnic groups, each with their own distinct language, culture, lifestyle.
Dayak people:
>200 ethnic subgroups of indigenous peoples of Borneo Orang Ulu:
Collective term for the ~30 tribes living in Sarawak (5.5% of the population).
Both terms are used for the Penan.
The Penan are one of the last nomadic hunter-gatherer tribes alive today and live along rivers deep within the tropical forests of Sarawak and Brunei. Numbering 10,000 total, only 350-500 individuals have yet to be forced or coerced into settling in longhouse ghettos predominately located in logged areas that have been stripped of their resources.
For the Penan, only what is needed is taken (‘molong’) and all is shared. Resources from the forest allow them to hunt (poison blowpipe) and harvest (sago palm) with a minimum impact on the land.
The Rainforest
“Eighty percent of Borneo is covered in tropical rain forest, one of the oldest and richest ecosystems on earth. Many of the life forms on Borneo are unique to the island. About one third of its plant species are found nowhere else on earth. Thirty of its birds are endemic, as are thirty-nine of its terrestrial mammals. Borneo is home to scattered populations of rare and endangered animals such as the Sumatran rhino and the orangutan. One entomologist working in Borneo identified some 600 species of butterflies and caterpillars in a single day. Another reported over a thousand species of cicadas.”
The Conflict
“Thirty years ago, the introduction of commercial logging [mainly The Samling Group] spurred encroachment onto the lands of Borneo’s indigenous peoples. The majority of all forests of Borneo have been licensed to logging and plantation concessions, and most of these overlap with ancestral indigenous land claims. In violation of international and national law, logging and oil palm companies are clearing and burning vast tracts of ancient forest on a scale often exceeding rates of destruction in the Amazon. Current estimates predict that Borneo’s rainforests will disappear by the year 2010.
Industrial logging and plantation development in Borneo’s forests have polluted rivers, degraded fragile forest ecosystems and made it difficult for communities to find the forest products they need to survive.
Forest destruction has led to a decline in the bird, fish and mammal populations dependent on trees for seeds and fruit, as well as to a loss of medicinal plant, rattan, and palm species. The incursion of roads has enabled poachers to access the area, and hillside erosion has led to extreme siltation of watersheds and coral reefs, which are affecting regional and global climate patterns. Forest destruction has threatened traditional systems of land management and inflicted poverty, pollution and social disintegration on once thriving communities.
Efforts to protect remaining land through blockades, demonstrations, and court cases have met with repression and brutality on the part of government agencies and corporations. As forest resources have become depleted, economic pressures have driven young villagers to leave their communities in search of employment. Industrial appropriation of indigenous land has compelled traditionally nomadic tribes to settle and become agriculturist, as their basic needs can no longer be fulfilled by forest resources. Recently settled nomads (Penan in Sarawak, Punan in East Kalimantan) are increasingly reliant on a cash economy for food, medicine, and other necessities. Tribes in transition to a settled lifestyle have little access to education and health facilities and lack basic survival knowledge such as food crop cultivation and construction of permanent living structures.
The Malaysian and Indonesian governments have done little to mitigate the impacts of forest destruction, and governmental conservation efforts have largely been a failure due to high demand for illegal timber by exports mills. In protected areas, bribes offered to government officials enable logging companies to carry out illegal operations. National and international laws that defend indigenous land rights are rarely enforced and frequently broken. Lands without written documentation of ownership are considered available for exploitation, and while Malaysian law recognizes native customary rights to lands occupied and cultivated by indigenous peoples, there is no official procedure to document such claims. Government requirements for written documentation of land ownership leave the burden of proof on communities who have had little or no access to titles or maps for these purposes.”
“Beginning in the late 1980s and continuing today the Penan and other Dayak have set up blockades in an attempt to halt logging operations on their land. These succeeded in many areas but the efforts were hard to sustain and ended in large-scale clashes between the indigenous communities and the state backed logging companies, supported by the police and Malaysian army. The confrontations ended with several deaths, many injuries and large-scale arrests of indigenous people.”
Bruno Manser
Bruno Manser, originally from Switzerland, lived among the Penan for six years (1984-1990) and was the initial impetus to action for the Penan. Sarawak officials denounced Bruno Manser as “a communist and Zionist” due to his living with the tribe and was declared persona non grata in Malaysia with a bounty of $40,000 on his head. He was last heard from through correspondence in 2000 from Sarawak and is missing/presumed dead.
Bulldozers and Blowpipes (VHS) featuring Manser, and his journal/testimonial book from those years (with wonderful drawings), Voices from the Rainforest, are recommended.
Anderson Mutang Urud
Anderson Mutang Urud from the Klabit (a settled tribe) has traveled internationally to increase awareness and heighten international concern for the situation in Sarawak. He was instrumental in founding the Sarawak Indigenous People’s Alliance (SIPA) in 1991 to disseminate information and campaign against unsustainable logging. He has been arrested and named in many court cases as a result of his efforts. The following excerpts are taken from the UN General Assembly on December 10, 1992 and from an interview on January 14, 1994 conducted by Prasiidananda Avadhuta
“When a timber company moves into the forest, it doesn’t consult us or pay us any compensation. When an area is logged, fish, wild animals, sago palms, rattan and medicinal plants disappear. The trees which bear the fruit which feeds the wild pigs are cut down for timber so the pigs disappear, and with them the main source of meat for our peoples.
Many of us are now hungry. Trees and vines with poisonous barks are felled, and find their way into the streams, killing the fish. Mud from land which can no longer keep its topsoil pollutes the rivers, bringing disease and destroying our sources of drinking water. Even when we mark our burial grounds, the logging companies bulldoze them with no regard for our feelings. Hundreds of graveyards have been destroyed in this way. When we complain about the destruction, they sometimes offer us a small sum of money as compensation. But this is an insult to us. How can we accept money that is traded for the bodies of our ancestors?
The Penan people are our neighbors in the forest. The Penans are totally dependent on the forest for their survival. Now, bulldozers and chain saws are destroying their way of life. As one of our old women said, ‘This logging is like a big tree that has fallen on our chest. I wake up in the middle of every night, worried and depressed. I talk to my husband and wonder what the future holds for our children.’
Our situation now is like a child who has fallen into a fast-flowing river and cannot swim. The child cries out, extending its arm for someone to help. If no one takes the hand, the child will surely drown. I ask you, the United Nations, must people die before you respond? Must there be war, and blood running in the streets, before the United Nations will come to a people’s assistance? Even though we are desperate, our people have avoided violence. We have used only peaceful methods of protest.
An old man I know once asked a policeman why it was he could not blockade a road on his own land. The policeman told him that Yayasan Sarawak had been given the license to log the forest, and so the land belongs to the company. This is what the old man said in reply, ‘Who is this Yayasan Sarawak?’ If he really owns the land, why have I never met him in the forest during my hunting trips over the last sixty years?’
The government says that it is bringing us progress and development. But the only development that we see is dusty logging roads and relocation camps. For us, their so-called progress means only starvation, dependence, helplessness, the destruction of our culture, and the demoralization of our people. The government says it is creating jobs for our people. But these jobs will disappear along with the forest. In ten years, the jobs will all be gone, and the forest which has sustained us for thousands of years will be gone with them. Why do we need jobs? My father and my grandfather did not have to ask the government for jobs. They were never unemployed. They lived from the land and from the forest. It was a good life. We had much leisure time, yet we were never hungry, or in need. These company jobs take men away from their families for months at a time. They are breaking apart the vital links that have held our families and our communities together for generations. These jobs bring our people into a consumer economy for which they are not prepared.
I say to my country, and to other developing countries, that in our race to modernize, we must respect the ancient cultures and traditions of our peoples. The wealth of indigenous communities lies not in money or in commodities, but in community, tradition, and a sense of belonging to a special place. The world is rushing toward a single culture. We should pause, and reflect on the beauty of diversity.”
The Penan of Sarawak
21 02 2009originally compiled by Rhymi Chavid, March 2008
Sarawak became an autonomous state of the federation of Malaysia on 16 September 1963. Since this time, logging has depleted 90% of Sarawak’s old growth forest ( >10 Ma ).
Area of Conflict: The Sarawak state of Malaysia on the island of Borneo in Southeast Asia
Population: 2.4 M (2006)
Area: 124,450 km^2
Ethnic majority: none
>40 ethnic groups, each with their own distinct language, culture, lifestyle.
Dayak people:
>200 ethnic subgroups of indigenous peoples of Borneo
Orang Ulu:
Collective term for the ~30 tribes living in Sarawak (5.5% of the population).
Both terms are used for the Penan.
The Penan are one of the last nomadic hunter-gatherer tribes alive today and live along rivers deep within the tropical forests of Sarawak and Brunei. Numbering 10,000 total, only 350-500 individuals have yet to be forced or coerced into settling in longhouse ghettos predominately located in logged areas that have been stripped of their resources.
For the Penan, only what is needed is taken (‘molong’) and all is shared. Resources from the forest allow them to hunt (poison blowpipe) and harvest (sago palm) with a minimum impact on the land.
The Rainforest
“Eighty percent of Borneo is covered in tropical rain forest, one of the oldest and richest ecosystems on earth. Many of the life forms on Borneo are unique to the island. About one third of its plant species are found nowhere else on earth. Thirty of its birds are endemic, as are thirty-nine of its terrestrial mammals. Borneo is home to scattered populations of rare and endangered animals such as the Sumatran rhino and the orangutan. One entomologist working in Borneo identified some 600 species of butterflies and caterpillars in a single day. Another reported over a thousand species of cicadas.”
The Conflict
“Thirty years ago, the introduction of commercial logging [mainly The Samling Group] spurred encroachment onto the lands of Borneo’s indigenous peoples. The majority of all forests of Borneo have been licensed to logging and plantation concessions, and most of these overlap with ancestral indigenous land claims. In violation of international and national law, logging and oil palm companies are clearing and burning vast tracts of ancient forest on a scale often exceeding rates of destruction in the Amazon. Current estimates predict that Borneo’s rainforests will disappear by the year 2010.
Industrial logging and plantation development in Borneo’s forests have polluted rivers, degraded fragile forest ecosystems and made it difficult for communities to find the forest products they need to survive.
Forest destruction has led to a decline in the bird, fish and mammal populations dependent on trees for seeds and fruit, as well as to a loss of medicinal plant, rattan, and palm species. The incursion of roads has enabled poachers to access the area, and hillside erosion has led to extreme siltation of watersheds and coral reefs, which are affecting regional and global climate patterns. Forest destruction has threatened traditional systems of land management and inflicted poverty, pollution and social disintegration on once thriving communities.
Efforts to protect remaining land through blockades, demonstrations, and court cases have met with repression and brutality on the part of government agencies and corporations. As forest resources have become depleted, economic pressures have driven young villagers to leave their communities in search of employment. Industrial appropriation of indigenous land has compelled traditionally nomadic tribes to settle and become agriculturist, as their basic needs can no longer be fulfilled by forest resources. Recently settled nomads (Penan in Sarawak, Punan in East Kalimantan) are increasingly reliant on a cash economy for food, medicine, and other necessities. Tribes in transition to a settled lifestyle have little access to education and health facilities and lack basic survival knowledge such as food crop cultivation and construction of permanent living structures.
The Malaysian and Indonesian governments have done little to mitigate the impacts of forest destruction, and governmental conservation efforts have largely been a failure due to high demand for illegal timber by exports mills. In protected areas, bribes offered to government officials enable logging companies to carry out illegal operations. National and international laws that defend indigenous land rights are rarely enforced and frequently broken. Lands without written documentation of ownership are considered available for exploitation, and while Malaysian law recognizes native customary rights to lands occupied and cultivated by indigenous peoples, there is no official procedure to document such claims. Government requirements for written documentation of land ownership leave the burden of proof on communities who have had little or no access to titles or maps for these purposes.”
“Beginning in the late 1980s and continuing today the Penan and other Dayak have set up blockades in an attempt to halt logging operations on their land. These succeeded in many areas but the efforts were hard to sustain and ended in large-scale clashes between the indigenous communities and the state backed logging companies, supported by the police and Malaysian army. The confrontations ended with several deaths, many injuries and large-scale arrests of indigenous people.”
Bruno Manser
Bruno Manser, originally from Switzerland, lived among the Penan for six years (1984-1990) and was the initial impetus to action for the Penan. Sarawak officials denounced Bruno Manser as “a communist and Zionist” due to his living with the tribe and was declared persona non grata in Malaysia with a bounty of $40,000 on his head. He was last heard from through correspondence in 2000 from Sarawak and is missing/presumed dead.
Bulldozers and Blowpipes (VHS) featuring Manser, and his journal/testimonial book from those years (with wonderful drawings), Voices from the Rainforest, are recommended.
Anderson Mutang Urud
Anderson Mutang Urud from the Klabit (a settled tribe) has traveled internationally to increase awareness and heighten international concern for the situation in Sarawak. He was instrumental in founding the Sarawak Indigenous People’s Alliance (SIPA) in 1991 to disseminate information and campaign against unsustainable logging. He has been arrested and named in many court cases as a result of his efforts. The following excerpts are taken from the UN General Assembly on December 10, 1992 and from an interview on January 14, 1994 conducted by Prasiidananda Avadhuta
“When a timber company moves into the forest, it doesn’t consult us or pay us any compensation. When an area is logged, fish, wild animals, sago palms, rattan and medicinal plants disappear. The trees which bear the fruit which feeds the wild pigs are cut down for timber so the pigs disappear, and with them the main source of meat for our peoples.
Many of us are now hungry. Trees and vines with poisonous barks are felled, and find their way into the streams, killing the fish. Mud from land which can no longer keep its topsoil pollutes the rivers, bringing disease and destroying our sources of drinking water. Even when we mark our burial grounds, the logging companies bulldoze them with no regard for our feelings. Hundreds of graveyards have been destroyed in this way. When we complain about the destruction, they sometimes offer us a small sum of money as compensation. But this is an insult to us. How can we accept money that is traded for the bodies of our ancestors?
The Penan people are our neighbors in the forest. The Penans are totally dependent on the forest for their survival. Now, bulldozers and chain saws are destroying their way of life. As one of our old women said, ‘This logging is like a big tree that has fallen on our chest. I wake up in the middle of every night, worried and depressed. I talk to my husband and wonder what the future holds for our children.’
Our situation now is like a child who has fallen into a fast-flowing river and cannot swim. The child cries out, extending its arm for someone to help. If no one takes the hand, the child will surely drown. I ask you, the United Nations, must people die before you respond? Must there be war, and blood running in the streets, before the United Nations will come to a people’s assistance? Even though we are desperate, our people have avoided violence. We have used only peaceful methods of protest.
An old man I know once asked a policeman why it was he could not blockade a road on his own land. The policeman told him that Yayasan Sarawak had been given the license to log the forest, and so the land belongs to the company. This is what the old man said in reply, ‘Who is this Yayasan Sarawak?’ If he really owns the land, why have I never met him in the forest during my hunting trips over the last sixty years?’
The government says that it is bringing us progress and development. But the only development that we see is dusty logging roads and relocation camps. For us, their so-called progress means only starvation, dependence, helplessness, the destruction of our culture, and the demoralization of our people. The government says it is creating jobs for our people. But these jobs will disappear along with the forest. In ten years, the jobs will all be gone, and the forest which has sustained us for thousands of years will be gone with them. Why do we need jobs? My father and my grandfather did not have to ask the government for jobs. They were never unemployed. They lived from the land and from the forest. It was a good life. We had much leisure time, yet we were never hungry, or in need. These company jobs take men away from their families for months at a time. They are breaking apart the vital links that have held our families and our communities together for generations. These jobs bring our people into a consumer economy for which they are not prepared.
I say to my country, and to other developing countries, that in our race to modernize, we must respect the ancient cultures and traditions of our peoples. The wealth of indigenous communities lies not in money or in commodities, but in community, tradition, and a sense of belonging to a special place. The world is rushing toward a single culture. We should pause, and reflect on the beauty of diversity.”
Sources:
The Borneo Project
Bruno Manser Fonds
Contributed by R. Chavid