Can the police be trusted to bring justice to Penan
Posted by Empelesik Sungai
First the police denied Penan girls and women were molested and raped. Yesterday the Women’s Ministry released a report confirming many cases.
1. Baby already born. How to deny that? You can deny molesting and raping the forest, the jungle, but you cannot deny raping a woman when she gave birth to a baby of different face, DNA.
2. When you rape the forest, the livelihood of the Penan you make use of the police to arrest them. You make use of your power to fight them, You use the law, foreign to the Penans, to fight them.
3. So, the international community must know this and boycott all timber produce by you. No more concessions. No more trees being cut. No more illegal logging.
4. I call Human Rights (SUHAKAM) not to talk big, but take action against this timber company. WTO please take action.
5. Malaysian and Sarawak government must be punished for their raping of the rich land of Sarawak. The land belongs to the people and not to cronies.
6. Save the Penans. Save the Dayak people
Dayakbaru:
We strongly urged the Sarawak police to bring the ’suspect” to court. It is fair justice that such “rapist” and “molestors” should be put behind bars to protect the larger community from their criminal behaviour.
Justice should be provided to every person who is qualify to receive them. The police would only gain the public trust and respect by carrying out their function without fear or favour.
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Inspirational word from gkm2020
hi,
from what i heard from the NGOs, the police here give alasan “no budget to officer deep into the jungle to investigate”.
strangely thet can afford to send mata-mata to monitor NGOs that go to help the penans here..
How sorrowful is this story…When will this tragedy end..How could any community allow this to happen to their women & children.My prayer goes out to these women..
You can download the full report from this link;
http://hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/3766/
Kindly translate to all languages and distribute the whole state of sarawak
When will Sarawakians help us from the peninsular to put away the ‘mother” of all “problems” of Malaysia in Putrajaya so that we can reach those disenfranchised Penans and fellow Malaysians in Sarawak?
On the peninsular, we have to face tear gas from PDRM and brutality from MACC and what not in our quest to bring change to OUR country.
Is it that difficult to put away tribal issues and see the need for a collective effort to rid UMNO from dominating the well-being of our country.
It is not easy for us on the peninsular to understand why when we came so close to putting UMNO/BN in opposition but they were helped by our brethren across the South China Sea!
Having said that, those of us from the peninsular are slowly but surely making amends for our past indifference. But we can only achieve so much unless Sarawakians can rise above tribal issues and look at the bigger picture of Malaysia.
http://romerz.blogspot.com/2009/09/fixed-deposit-of-bn.html
Pulis can do anything in this case of defending those oppress they only a rooster that shout in early of the morning and then silent for the rest of the day.
The always busy mentioning about evidence, since the evidence is there and report is already being made still no action. What is this pulis?
See, how Jabu is ….
He is ALWAYS the first Dayak Yb to refute things that have serious impact on the Dayak, in this the Penan. He has negative thought on NGOs investigating the rampant rape cases of the Penan. It looks like he is a bloody fool to have drawn a conclusion without even reading the report.
This is a typical behaviour of Iban YBs, always refuting the truths. But when it comes to defend the Dayak rights , they are the first to run away.
Cheers…
The Penan Rape Report: Another Denial Game Again??
The Penan girls were indeed raped!
Gov’t report confirms Penan girls were raped
Keruah Usit, Sep-9 2009, Malaysiakini
The government has made public a shocking report on sexual abuse of Penan girls and women by logging camp workers in Baram, Sarawak. Women, Family and Community Development Minister Shahrizat Abdul Jalil yielded to pressure from civil society groups to investigate the claims. The report was handed over to PKR women’s chief Zuraida Kamaruddin on Sept 8, almost a year after media accounts of rape of Penan girls by loggers first appeared.
The report lists at least eight cases of sexual abuse of Penan girls and women by logging camp workers. The report said several of the victims were schoolgirls as young as 10. Local NGOs claim these documented cases were only a small fraction of the total number of cases of sexual abuse.
The ministry’s National Task Force was commissioned by the cabinet on Oct 8 last year, to investigate the claims. The ministry’s team visited Long Item, Long Kawi, Long Luteng, Long Belok, Kampung Ugos, Jambatan Suai, Niah between Nov 10 and 15 last year. Shahrizat’s predecessor, Ng Yen Yen, had promised a transparent investigation. The team was led by director-general of the Department of Women’s Development, Dr Noorul Ainor Mohd Nor. The team was made up of several federal ministries, Sarawak government agencies and NGOs, Women’s Aid Organisation and Women’s Centre for Change, Penang.
The team concluded that “allegations of sexual abuse of Penan girls and women by outsiders dealing with the Penan, including logging company workers and merchants, did indeed take place”. The protracted delay in releasing the report opened Shahrizat to accusations of trying to cover up the scandal which displeased powerful logging companies in Sarawak.
Shahrizat (right) had previously refused to comment on the delay and instead invited “interested parties” to view the report at her ministry’s office in Putrajaya.
Fear of retaliation
The report said the girls’ vulnerability, widespread poverty and “dependency on the logging companies for transportation into towns, including sending and ferrying of children to and from schools” was among the reasons for incidents of sexual abuse. It also said poverty and lack of access to transportation have “prevented many residents from going into towns to register their children’s births, and as a result many have no identity cards”.
The team also found that access to healthcare and education is inadequate because of the long distances required to travel to schools and clinics. Noorul’s team interviewed two victims, Cindy and Bibi (not their real names). The two girls had travelled to Kuala Lumpur to make police reports at Bukit Aman. Bibi told her interviewers that she had been raped on two occasions by Johnny (not his real name).
Bibi said she did not report the incident to the police because she was illiterate; furthermore, “she did not know how to make a report”. She did not tell her family who the rapist was because she was afraid of retaliation. She said Johnny had sent food to her family and claimed her as his wife.
But Bibi rejected him because she said, Johnny already has two wives, one of whom is a Penan. Johnny was portrayed as a loving husband and father by reports in a local Sarawak newspaper, owned by a timber company. Cindy said she was raped when she was 12 by an unidentified ‘outsider’, and then raped again years later by a logging camp worker. She bore a child as result of the second rape.
Sexual abuse ‘common’
The girls were quoted in the report as saying that it is a regular and common occurrence for logging camp workers to sexually abuse girls who hitch rides to and from school. One girl, aged 10, said she and her classmates were taken to some bushes when they hitched a ride on a logging truck to get home from school, and that the driver had attempted to rape her.
Other schoolgirls described how logging truck drivers forced schoolboys and other passengers off the vehicles, and made off with young girls. The girls said they usually told their own families of the sexual abuse but not their teachers, because “they were afraid the teachers would accuse them of lying in order to avoid going to school”.
The girls said they were afraid of being caned and punished if they reported the abuse to their teachers. The report concluded that these communities reject such sexual violence. However, it went on to say the Penan are vulnerable to such abuse because they are deprived of basic transportation and facilities such as healthcare, access to schools, water and electricity supply.
The Penan are also vulnerable because of prejudice against them, and a lack of trust in government authorities, according to the report. Neither the Sarawak police nor Bukit Aman have mounted a credible investigation into the government’s own findings.
———————————-
Penan Support Group media statement on the Rape and Sexual Abuse of Penan Girls and Women in Baram
By Penan Support Group, Friday, 11 September 2009
The police, it appears, are still in denial. Or at best, are ineffectual.
In September 2008, news broke out that Penan girls, some as young as 10 years, were being sexually abused by logging workers in the Middle Baram area of Sarawak. However, local politicians and the police were quick to dismiss these as mere allegations without any basis.
Such lackadaisical attitudes compelled the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development to establish a National Task Force comprising ministry officials and women NGO representatives to investigate the ‘allegations’. Aided by local activists in Sarawak, they were able to meet with some of the victims and their families in November 2008.
Ten months later, on 8 September 2009, the report was finally made public. The findings, however, were not surprising – the rapes and sexual abuse did occur and the Penan girls are still vulnerable because of the lack of policing and development in their area.
The police, it appears, are still in denial. Or at best, are ineffectual.
The Associated Press reported that Huzir Mohamed, the head of Sarawak’s police criminal investigations department, probed three complaints last year but found “nothing with proper evidence for us to proceed in court.” Huzir also insinuated that this was due in part because “the activists did not give specific details to support their claims”.
We take offence to this statement and perception. We maintain that it is the police who have dragged their feet in this matter before back-pedalling on their earlier willingness to work with NGOs on this matter.
For the record, it should be stressed that it was the police who invited us to the meeting with the IGP and other senior police officers at Bukit Aman on 2 January 2009. The police knew they were unable to get the victims and the witnesses to come forward to give information and statements simply because the Penans did not trust the police. Instead, they trusted the NGOs more.
At this meeting, the IGP pledged that Bukit Aman would give its fullest support to a Police-NGO joint investigation mission.
Towards this end, Datuk Seri Mohd Bakri Mohd Zinin, the Director of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), together with senior police officers from Sarawak, met with Sarawakian NGOs on 20 January 2009 in Kuching. The purpose was to discuss logistics and terms of references for the joint investigation mission.
As requested, a draft Terms of Reference (TOR) for the joint investigation mission and a proposed itinerary for a week-long mission were subsequently submitted for their approval. The Sarawak NGOs gave an assurance that the police team would be able to meet the Penan victims and witnesses, but in neutral venues that were acceptable to the Penans.
It took the police seven (7) months to respond. At another meeting on 17 August 2009 in Kuching with SAC Huzir Mohamed of the Sarawak Police, the Miri Resident Officer and some others, we were told that the RM100,000.00 allocated for the joint-investigation mission by the Sarawak Police Contingent was only for their use and not for the NGO’s participation.
In short, we got the impression that they did not want the NGOs to be involved in the investigation. Our role was only to make sure the Penan victims and witnesses turned up at the place and date of interview as appointed by the police. The official written reply from the CID Director dated 27 August 2009 suggested that this was so.
It was also clear from the meeting on 17 August 2009 that the police and the authorities were incapable of appreciating the fact that the crux of the whole issue at hand is the distrust the Penans have for the police and the authorities, let alone the loggers.
So, to entrust the Resident’s Office to provide personnel such as interpreters and to depend on the logging companies for transport, as suggested at the meeting, is as good as saying you are not interested in getting to the truth of the matter.
The police may cite procedure and laws for not going ahead with the IGP’s pledge to have a joint Police-NGO investigation mission, but their willingness to work with parties that are a part of the problem, leads us to suspect the sincerity of the police in their handling of the sexual abuses cases among the Penans.
The Penan Support Group considers the long-occurring sexual abuse of the Penan girls a hideous crime. It is also a distressing symptom of the overall situation the Penans and other vulnerable indigenous groups in Sarawak are facing today. We are committed to seeking justice for the victims and to expose and correct the wrongs being committed in Penan society.
———————————-
Let’s recall back how J*bu conveniently denied the rape allegation and instead shoot the messenger:
Penan sex claim is baseless, says Jabu
New Straits Times Thu, Sep 25, 2008, By Desmond Davidson
KUCHING, MALAYSIA: Sarawak Deputy Chief Minister Tan Sri Alfred Jabu yesterday dismissed the claims of a Swiss non-governmental organisation that Penan women and girls were being sexually abused by workers from two logging companies. Jabu said unless the Bruno Manser Fund could give details of their allegations, it would be a waste of time to investigate. “Show proof. Tell us which Penan settlement.” “I have not heard of such complaints from the Penan community leaders in my many visits to Ulu Baram,” said Jabu, who is the chairman of the steering committee on the Penans, after launching Ops Sikap XVII at Km19 of the Kuching-Serian Road.
BMF had posted the allegations on its website, claiming that the workers preyed on students who were in the settlement during school holidays. It also claimed that the abuse had resulted in several pregnancies. Jabu said if the NGO could provide evidence, then the police could take action. He was also dismissive of BMF, labelling it a “bunch of people who are nothing in their own country but like to sensationalise events elsewhere”. Jabu urged the BMF and other NGOs not to paint a negative picture of Sarawak and to respect the truth. “Hearsay and sweeping statements are unfair to Sarawak.”
Meanwhile, on road accidents during the festive season, Jabu said Sarawak bucked the national trend. Pointing to statistics during the Hari Raya period of Ops Sikap XI in 2006 and Ops Sikap XIII last year, Jabu said even though the number of accidents rose by 2.2 per cent, from 602 in 2006 to 615 in 2007, the number of fatal accidents dipped by 14.3 per cent, from 14 to 12. The number of road deaths also dropped by 23.5 per cent from 17 in 2006 to 13 last year. He urged road users to be vigilant when driving home for the festive celebration.
Now the culprits who raped the Penan girls has been identified.I hereby challenge Dayabaru/s to come up with a plan to punish Samling’s management- prove that you walk the talk and not a mere rethoric to uphold justice for the under previllage.
fully hope not our Iban logging camp worker involve.
Sapa-sapa ke ngibun penemu baka enggi Dayaklama, nya meh orang ke amat-amat nyadi penghianat Bansa Dayak. Sida tu ukai semina ngembuan Sirat Political Mentality tang mega mai bansa bukai nganchur ka bansa kitai Dayak.
Udah merogol, Dayaklama deka rari minta taan ka aki iya Taib, Jabu enggau Hiew Teck Seng, lalu ngumbai DB nadai apak, penakut.
Unggal DL,
enda iboh meh ngena plan DB deka ngukum sida ke ngembarka indu penan enda beradat nya. Menua kitai udah bisi undang ke manah terit kena ngukum sida nya. Enti nitihka ati aku, aku sigi ka netak batang sida ke enda beradat nya ga unggal awakka sida iya merinsa deka ngemuaska nafsu ke buas nya.
pelaba aku sida ke ngerogol nya tentu sida anak samling ke endang uchu Taib ke bendar ga.
Dayaklama,
Police will definitely go through the report made by task force of the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry to facilitate their investigation into this hideous crime.
Yes, Jabu also wanted to see the report. For what? He is no power to investigate and arrest the culprits.
They are actually raping the forest, the dwelling place of the Penans. Perhaps some workers thought that the little Penan girls were monkeys for they have been too long away fro, their wives, slashing the jungle for the benefit of their towkays.
“Kami polis mesti turut perintah dan arahan kerajaan sebab KERAJAAN yang bayar gaji kami!”
And dogs will never bite the hands of their master who feeds them, so they say…..
Little wonder that rampant and glaring corruptions and abuse of power of those in the government were never investigated,least of all persecuted.
When will the polis ever learn that what they earn comes from the pockets of the millions of Malaysians through taxes….not from those of crooked politicians and their business cronies.
Polis, where lie your conscience and loyalty?
Anang arap polis ka nangkap sida nya ka salah, peda kitak di menua Sarawak tu aja, maioh kereta cina cermin naka iya penyelum, nadai meh polis berani nyaman. Polis di Sarawak tu pengecut, nadai pelir & pemalas (useless to the society).
Nya aja comment aku.