NEP has failed Sabah Natives

DAILY EXPRESS NEWS
14 February, 2008

Kota Kinabalu: Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) Sabah has called for a review of the New Economic Policy (NEP), which it claimed has totally failed in Sabah as the latest economic statistics indicate that most of the hardcore poor in Sabah are actually natives.

Its Information Chief, Dr Edwin Bosi, said the policy on Native Title also needs to be reviewed to the effect that land applied for under Native Title shall not be limited to 20 hectares and for agricultural purposes only.

In a statement here, he said experience in the United States of America showed that a minimum of 100 hectares was needed for a successful family-style agriculture estate.

Responding to the establishment of the Land Bureau by United Pasok Momogun Kadazandusun Murut Organisation (Upko) on Saturday in Ranau, Bosi said a documentary title for land under customary rights must be speedily issued so that the owner could have access to credit facility from banking institutions.

The land law should also gear towards enabling natives to capitalise and optimise commercial value of their land and open native land to the universal market such as time sharing accommodation, hotels and issuance of strata titles, he added.

Referring to a paper by lawyer Yunof Maringking on land issues in Sabah, Bosi said it was stated that "we not only need a pragmatic land policy but a political will to change the current land issues in Sabah".

In the paper, Yunof said the Land and Survey Department had revealed that the total area of State land available for alienation in Sabah is about 500,000 hectares. Despite its huge land mass, land available for production and development is very limited.

Yunof mentioned that most of the owners of the 350,000 hectares alienated under Country Lease (CL) up to the year 1994 are big companies from outside Sabah. No statistics are given after 1994 and this does not include the 2.7 million hectares of forest reserve given to 10 companies under the FMU for 100 years.

The department's statistics showed that out of the 350,000 hectares, only 60,000 hectares are under Native Title. This clearly means that many natives in Sabah are landless which is economically and politically disturbing, according to Yunof.

However, Bosi said it was a constitutional duty of the Government of the day to protect the wellbeing of the natives in Sabah but the burning of rudimentary houses and destruction of crops of some natives in Pitas by the Forestry Department shows natives do not have rights on their own land.

In Kinabatangan, oil palm belonging to natives and grown in forest reserves were destroyed purportedly to preserve the forest reserve. "On the other hand, millions of hectares are given away to companies under the FMU for 100 years which can only mean that natives are treated no better than the Red Indians in America," he claimed.

Bosi said Yunof's paper stressed that that there must be political will to uplift the economic status of the natives in Sabah by providing them with the necessary legal physical infrastructures and also proper institutional infrastructure.

A PKR government would rectify the current situation of unbalanced land ownership in line with the State and Federal Constitution and formulate innovative ideas in entrepreneurship for the young generation who have the skills and training in land based business, he added.