Not enough to gazette Tasik Chini as forest reserve, says lawyer

 

Merely gazetting Tasik Chini, Pahang, as a forest reserve would not provide adequate protection for the lake and its surrounding ecosystem, said the lawyer Rajesh Nagarajan.

This is because state governments can unilaterally gazette and degazette permanent forest reserves under the National Forestry Act 1984 (NFA) by simply publishing a notice in the national gazette.

“As such any ‘protection’ afforded by the gazettement is purely illusory.

“It is an inarguable fact that the forests in Malaysia are not going to be protected from destruction by the state governments under the NFA,” he told Malaysiakini in a statement today.

For the record, Section 11 of the NFA stipulates that if a state government is “satisfied” that land in a permanent forest reserve is no longer required for its purpose, or is required for “economic use higher than that for which it is being utilised”, it may be excised from the permanent forest reserve.

Section 12 says land excised from forest reserves should be replaced by a roughly equal-sized land “whenever possible”, if the state government thinks it is in the national interest to do so.

“Forests are frequently degazetted and licences granted for logging, mining and other activities that are detrimental to the Orang Asli, the flora, the fauna and the environment in general.

“It is a matter of public record that the power granted under Section 11 and Section 16 of the NFA is wielded capriciously, resulting in massive deforestation in Malaysia. The provisions of the NFA are deficient and do not allow for the protection of forests in Malaysia,” said Rajesh, who is also representing the Orang Asli community in Gua Musang, Kelantan, in a land dispute.

In the Gua Musang land dispute, the Orang Asli folk are accusing several companies of encroaching their ancestral land that they needed to sustain their livelihood and destroying their burial sites.

Earlier, Malaysiakini reported that an area covering 4,600ha said to have been gazetted as a permanent forest reserve in 2019 has yet to be gazetted, even though it has already been two years.

This is in light of Pahang Regent Tengku Hassanal Ibrahim Alam Shah’s call on June 14 for the “existing” 4,600ha of forest reserve to be expanded to between 6,000ha and 7,000ha amid concerns that mining activities there could threaten the lake.

Pahang Forestry Department director Mohd Hizamri Mohd Yasin said the delay in gazetting the original area is due to several mining licences in the area that are still in effect, prior to a moratorium being imposed on new licences beginning 2019. - Mkini