Malaysia: Penan villagers wrongfully arrested

Long Lunyim is a Penan community from Sungai Pelutan, Baram, located in
the Miri Division of the state of Sarawak, Malaysia which used to be a
part of another village called Long Tepen. The people of Long Lunyim
decided some years ago to leave the village of Long Tepen and establish a
new settlement for themselves over disputes with the Long Tepen's headman
on the encroachment of logging activities onto their customary land. Long
Lunyim however still stands within the original territory of Long Tepen,
the only difference is that it is a separate longhouse altogether, located
slightly further away from Long Tepen.

The original village Long Tepen now has only few families, mainly kin of
its pro-logging chief. Over the course of several years, the logging
company showered the chief with cash and his sons with jobs with the
company in exchange for the people's land including parcels which are
protected and cultivated by those who no longer wish to be under his
authority.

The company operating here is Lajong Lumber, a subsidiary of Rimbunan
Hijau.

However what ensued in the end was that the company's operations started
to get nearer and nearer to Long Lunyim and eventually encroached onto its
individual farms and communal forestland. When the Long Lunyim people went to the company to complain and to demand LL to stop their operations, the company would simply reply that it had already paid their chief and that
he had allowed them to enter the land.

The Long Lunyim community had written several letters from 2000 - 2003 to
several local authorities and the company itself asserting among others,
that they no longer belonged to Long Tepen or the authority of its chief
and committee and since they far outnumbered the latter the company had no
right to buy their consent from Long Tepen. In Nov 2000, there was even a
police report lodged against the company and of course nothing ever
happened.

In Aug 2003, a blockade was put up by Long Lunyim which was then
dismantled after six days when the protestors were invited to see the
General Manager of the company in Miri. There, the GM was reportedly
receptive to all of their demands.

However on Sept 4, the police came looking for a member of Long Lunyim,
Mr. Semali Sait -- promptly arrested him and confiscated his father's gun,
which by the way, does possess a valid licence. They handcuffed him all
the way to the Marudi Police Station, a journey by land and river which
could have taken some 6 -- 7 hours.

His fellow villagers became highly traumatised in the process, a bad thing
when you are about to begin your planting season. The next day his father
Sait Kiling went to the nearest police station to demand explanation and
get his gun back and he too was then arrested, handcuffed and brought to
the Marudi lockup. Both father and son were under remand for 8 days and
were then wrongfully charged under Section 506 of the Penal Code for
alleged criminal intimidation. They are now out on bail.

The reason for the arrest and charges was simply because of a police
report lodged by Lajong Lumber's Camp Manager and a worker who claimed
that on August 30, they were threatened and intimidated by five Long
Lunyim villagers, including Semali and his father. The two of them however
vehemently denied the accusation and they have proof to back their
claims.

For all the time spent to see the GM and the running around they had to do
for almost half a month in August and more in Sept, to protect their land,
the company meanwhile, managed to push in 10 tractors, 2 units for road
construction and 8 for logging, into the people's forest reserve area, to
grab all the timber there was quickly. The arrests were simply a
multipurpose solution to give way and time for the company to carry on
logging while the people were either in jail, worried sick in Marudi for
the two and the other three who were never detained but named in the
police report or scared to death back at home.

The arrests had caused the people of Long Lunyim severe emotional stress
and were also costly to them and us at SAM, because they had to make the
journey out of their village all the way to Marudi and spend almost two
weeks here. Their planting schedule was also delayed.

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