The backhoe on the customary land of the Mah Meri working close to a grave.
Roslan anak Ligam, 54, was detained overnight so as to enable the police to carry out investigations into land clearing actvities in the Mah Meri’s traditional territories of Kampung Bakar, Sungai Bumbun, Pulau Carey. Kampung Bakar is a small satellite hamlet of about 50 persons next to Kampung Sungai Bumbun on Pulau Carey.
The following is a report compiled in the field by Koong Hui Yein and Jenita Engi, with information from the affected villagers.
Date of Incident: Tuesday, 16 September 2104.
Place: Kampung Bakar, Sungai Bumbun, Pulau Carey, Selangor
Ethnic group: Mah Meri
About 9am
Two Indonesian workers, husband and wife team, came to measure the site, informing villagers that the area behind the Dewan Kampung (village hall) will be the site of an indian temple. The couple left after finishing measuring.
About 1pm
Pakcik Kisah anak Aken saw bulldozer entering the village compound and heading towards area near his wife’s grave who died recently, and started digging. The digging was about 200 meters from the Dewan and about 10 meters away from the grave.
Pak Kisah got worried and approached the tractor, which had two Indian men in it. One of them saw Pak Kisah and went down to confront Pak Kisah, shouting, “Lu manyak action ah! Lu manyak garang ah!” (You think you are very big? You think you are very fierce?)
According to Pak Kisah, he did not say anything before that. Then the Indians started taking out metal poles, about 1.5 meters in length, and pointed and shouted at Pak Kisah.
“Kalau kamu tak pindah kubur kamu tu, saya akan ambil semua kawasan kamu”.
(If you don’t move the grave, I will take all of your land.”)
The indian is named Supia, according to villagers. They were hitting the tractor with their metal poles as a sign of warning to Pak Kisah with gesture of about to hit Pak Kisah. Pak Kisah felt scared and threatened.
After this commotion, the tractor continued working and was driven back to the area near the Dewan. Then there was a lorry who came by to unload cement bricks, metal poles, gravels and sand.
Then Roslan called up Banting police station to lodge a report. Half an hour later, one police patrol car (BHG 9153) came with two policemen in uniform. Roslan and the Indian man were arguing while policemen were there.
The Indian complained that they had made so many reports about Orang Asli trespassing “their” land but no action was taken.
According to Samsudin, his father, Roslan, had himself lodged 3 police reports since 16 Sept 2013. The police did not act on any of these.
Roslan anak Ligam, detained overnight. 2011 picture.
3.00pm
Then, more policemen came, but not in uniform. They came in two cars (WJY 9413 and WKP 1850). One of them took Roslan aside and brought him into one of the cars (WKP 1850). The police said that Roslan will be taken away for the purpose of “siasat” (investigation). This was about 3pm.
4.15pm
7 of Roslan’s friends and family arrived at the Banting police station to find out what happened to Roslan.
One of the officers came out together with Roslan and explained to the group that Roslan will be detained until the next day after being investigated by Inspector Khairul.
He said that Roslan was being detained to help in the investigations based on a report lodged by Supia’s group.
Kampung Bakar is not in an Orang Asli Reserve. But that area was their traditional territory for hundreds of years. The Mah Meri villagers have demanded the group of Indians to present proof of land title to the area but to date no documents were shown to villagers.
Their native customary land is sized at about 34 acres.
For more information, please contact
Samsudin anak Roslan 0111-437 7014
Kampung Bakar, Pulau Carey
for first hand informatio
or
Hui Yein 012 686 3457
JOAS Secretariat
Jaringan Orang Asal SeMalaysia
Villagers discuss their next move, with police/SB mingling around.
Police at the site before the arrest.