Sabah villagers counting on history in forest ‘ownership’ dispute

 

An aerial view of Kampung Bundu Tuhan near Mount Kinabalu and the forests surrounding the hilly village. (Sabah forest department pic)

KOTA KINABALU: Villagers in Bundu Tuhan near Mount Kinabalu are hoping historical factors will favour their bid for a tract of disputed forest near their kampung to remain under their watch.

Bundu Tuhan Committee of Trustees chairman Johnny Ghani said the state government had approved 1,263ha as the villagers’ native residential reserve five decades ago.

That native residential reserve included a 760ha pristine forest, about the size of Petaling Jaya, which Johnny said their forefathers had been safeguarding for generations.

Recently, however, state secretary of natural resources Sernam Singh was reported to be weighing whether to allow the 760ha to remain under the watch of the Bundu Tuhan villagers or be placed under the control of the Sabah forestry department as part of the Class 1 totally protected Tinompok Forest Reserve.

“The border markers were laid by Sabah land and survey department staff assisted by the villagers between 1965 and 1968,” Johnny told FMT.

“This was done after an application by community leaders for this area to be set aside as native residential reserve was approved by the department.”

He said it was only in 1983 that the matter was officially finalised with the issuance of a government gazette signed by the Yang di-Pertua Negeri.

That same year, the villagers instituted a community conservation initiative known in their native Kadazandusun as “bombon” or “tagal”, where entry to the tract of forest was restricted and the villagers could harvest produce such as wild fruits or vegetables for their own use only with permission.

Johnny explained that hunting and tree felling were expressly forbidden as part of the forest bombon, believed to be the first of its type in Sabah. Similar community conservation initiatives have largely been limited to rivers.

Meanwhile, Sabah forestry department chief conservator Frederick Kugan explained that the Tinompok forest reserve that encompassed the 760ha tract of forest was gazetted in 1984 although it had been proposed years earlier.

He said the 760ha of pristine forest known locally as “hutan winokok” was a crucial water catchment area and had been earmarked to remain as a protected area under the status of a class 1 forest reserve.

Frederick said the overlapping “jurisdiction” of this area was not an issue until recently when the Bundu Tuhan villagers asked for the tract of forest to be “excised” from the Tinompok forest reserve and placed under their control.

He said the department had attempted to resolve the matter amicably whereby the department had proposed that the 760ha remain as a forest reserve but with special privileges and rights given to the Bundu Tuhan community based on Section 14 of the Forest Enactment.

He said Sabah would lose 760ha of its totally protected areas if this forest was excised from the Tinompok forest reserve. - FMT