KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 19 — The High Court ordered today the Pahang Land and Mines Office to return parts of a 2,000-hectare piece of land near Temerloh it had gazetted as a Malay reserve to the Semelai aborigine tribe as the Orang Asli’s customary rights took precedence over others in a landmark land rights case.
Temerloh High Court judge Akhtar Tahir also ruled a land development project under the Federal Land Consolidation and Rehabilitation Authority (Felcra) scheme in the Bukit Rok and Kampung Ibam areas to be illegal and ordered them to be removed.
The judge ordered the state agency to gazette the entire area as Orang Asli customary land within a year, The Star Online reported.
“The rights accrued when the Semelai people inhabited the land even before other inhabitants, including the Malays, arrived.
“Both the Felcra and Malay reserve land are subject to the rights of the Orang Asli,” he was quoted as saying by the English-language news portal.
The land dispute went to court five years ago when Bukit Rok village chief, Rok Mohamad Nohing and five others filed a suit against the state Land and Mines Office director, the Pahang government, the Orang Asli Development Department director-general and the federal government in a bid to reclaim their native customary land from encroachment after they learned it had been gazetted as a Malay reserve.
In his ruling, Justice Akhtar was reported as saying the court recognised the Semelai people through early writings and remnants of their existence.
The judge was reported to have advised the government to keep better records on land documents, as the search for the papers had been lengthy.
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