http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/265334
11 June 2014
Ba’Kelalan assemblyperson Baru Bian has expressed deep concern over the drug abuse problem in the district of Lawas that is getting worse as some police personnel are allegedly involved in supplying drugs to addicts. read more here.
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A bit of background,
In Lawas, death of Lun Bawang teen sparks ethnic tensions (26 September 2012)
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/in-lawas-death-of-lun-bawang-teen-sparks-ethnic-tensions
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 26 — Hundreds of upset Lun Bawang natives who took to the streets in a Sarawak border town following the controversial death of a 19-year-old teenage boy from their tribe last Friday have sparked fears of a racial and religious fallout with Malay-Muslims, the Borneo Post reported today.
Edwin Singa Pelipus from the village of Long Lopeng — roughly 2km from the timber and agricultural Lawas town in north Sarawak, which borders Brunei to the west and Sabah to the east — was stabbed to death with a screwdriver in a fight last Friday evening in an incident believed to have involved several Kedayan Malay Muslims.
His death triggered an immediate outburst of anger from friends, relatives and people from Long Lopeng and nearly Sipitang and Ba’Kelalan who gathered in Lawas over the last two days and led a march demanding justice for the youth, the English-language daily reported.
Their presence had raised fears from the local Kedayan Malay community who felt threatened and responded by mounting their own gathering in the town, leading to clashes with the Lun Bawang community, who are predominantly Christians.
Malay Muslims make up 60 per cent of Malaysia’s 28 million total population, but indigenous Christians in Sarawak form the bulk of the country’s religious minority group that number 10 per cent.
The police have arrested 11 people who are suspected of being involved in the teen’s killing, the Borneo Post reported, adding that three of them will be charged with murder.
Sarawak police commissioner Datuk Acryl Sani Abdullah Sani was cited by The Borneo Post as confirming the tensions were due to long-standing feuds between the two ethnic groups and urging them to settle their disputes peacefully through lawful channels set up under the state government.
“Do not spill your quarrel over to the public but settle it through your community leaders and headmen,” Acryl was quoted as saying by the widely-read daily, the largest English-language paper circulating in Borneo.
But others, including Ba’Kelalan state lawmaker Baru Bian, say that the killing was the culmination of the authorities’ failure to crack down on vice activities, especially the drug menace which has been growing over the years.
“The protesters, I was told, wanted to highlight the syabu menace that has been plaguing Lawas and demanded the authorities to investigate and stop the well-known activities of the trafficking and use of illicit drugs in the region, especially syabu,” he said in a media statement today, referring to the local name for methamphetamine.
Baru, who is also a lawyer who has championed for indigenous rights, noted there were past cases of physical violence over the last 10 years that had resulted in bodily harm in Lawas due to widespread drug abuse, which he said were perpetrated by the same group of people.
“This is not a race or religious issue and we must not allow this incident to become one. Let no party or persons claim that racial or religious sensitivities have been affected,” he said, echoing calls from the police and local community leaders in Sarawak who played down the rising ethnic tensions.
A Lawas local, who only wanted to be known as Balang, told The Malaysian Insider the drug culture has been growing insidiously since the 1980s but had long been neglected, and that Edwin’s death was the tipping point as the Lun Bawang community was fed up by government inaction.
“It’s a 20-year-old problem. Most of our young boys are caught up in this. There have been small cases here and there but the police have not taken action.
“When it happens, people go ‘Where is the policeman?’” said the 40-year-old who is regarded as the go-to person on local culture, customs.
Balang described it as a long-standing problem involving vice and debt, but was unclear on the two communities’ roles in the situation.
Lawas and nearby Limbang were known as Sarawak’s sin capitals in the 1970s right up to the 1990s and saw prostitution dens, sleazy massage parlours and pubs mushrooming in town, which have been systematically cleaned up over the years.
But progress appears to have been impeded by allegations of widespread corruption, unresolved native land issues, a lack of basic infrastructure and breach of constitutional safeguards as contained in the 18-Point Agreement for Sarawak and the 20-Point for Sabah over the past decades.
Malaysia’s two easternmost states also rank among the country’s top three poorest states — Sabah’s overall poverty is the nation’s highest at 19.7 per cent, while Sarawak is third at 5.3 per cent, according to official statistics from the 2009 National Household Income Survey Report.
While police have beefed up their local presence with an extra platoon of General Operations Force and 45 more officers from Miri and Limbang and the streets of Lawas have quietened down, there is still a lingering sense of unease, Balang said.
“Yah, there are more police now. It is now very quiet. People are scared to go out,” he said.
11 June 2014
Ba’Kelalan assemblyperson Baru Bian has expressed deep concern over the drug abuse problem in the district of Lawas that is getting worse as some police personnel are allegedly involved in supplying drugs to addicts. read more here.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
A bit of background,
In Lawas, death of Lun Bawang teen sparks ethnic tensions (26 September 2012)
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/in-lawas-death-of-lun-bawang-teen-sparks-ethnic-tensions
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 26 — Hundreds of upset Lun Bawang natives who took to the streets in a Sarawak border town following the controversial death of a 19-year-old teenage boy from their tribe last Friday have sparked fears of a racial and religious fallout with Malay-Muslims, the Borneo Post reported today.
Edwin Singa Pelipus from the village of Long Lopeng — roughly 2km from the timber and agricultural Lawas town in north Sarawak, which borders Brunei to the west and Sabah to the east — was stabbed to death with a screwdriver in a fight last Friday evening in an incident believed to have involved several Kedayan Malay Muslims.
His death triggered an immediate outburst of anger from friends, relatives and people from Long Lopeng and nearly Sipitang and Ba’Kelalan who gathered in Lawas over the last two days and led a march demanding justice for the youth, the English-language daily reported.
Their presence had raised fears from the local Kedayan Malay community who felt threatened and responded by mounting their own gathering in the town, leading to clashes with the Lun Bawang community, who are predominantly Christians.
Malay Muslims make up 60 per cent of Malaysia’s 28 million total population, but indigenous Christians in Sarawak form the bulk of the country’s religious minority group that number 10 per cent.
The police have arrested 11 people who are suspected of being involved in the teen’s killing, the Borneo Post reported, adding that three of them will be charged with murder.
Sarawak police commissioner Datuk Acryl Sani Abdullah Sani was cited by The Borneo Post as confirming the tensions were due to long-standing feuds between the two ethnic groups and urging them to settle their disputes peacefully through lawful channels set up under the state government.
“Do not spill your quarrel over to the public but settle it through your community leaders and headmen,” Acryl was quoted as saying by the widely-read daily, the largest English-language paper circulating in Borneo.
But others, including Ba’Kelalan state lawmaker Baru Bian, say that the killing was the culmination of the authorities’ failure to crack down on vice activities, especially the drug menace which has been growing over the years.
“The protesters, I was told, wanted to highlight the syabu menace that has been plaguing Lawas and demanded the authorities to investigate and stop the well-known activities of the trafficking and use of illicit drugs in the region, especially syabu,” he said in a media statement today, referring to the local name for methamphetamine.
Baru, who is also a lawyer who has championed for indigenous rights, noted there were past cases of physical violence over the last 10 years that had resulted in bodily harm in Lawas due to widespread drug abuse, which he said were perpetrated by the same group of people.
“This is not a race or religious issue and we must not allow this incident to become one. Let no party or persons claim that racial or religious sensitivities have been affected,” he said, echoing calls from the police and local community leaders in Sarawak who played down the rising ethnic tensions.
A Lawas local, who only wanted to be known as Balang, told The Malaysian Insider the drug culture has been growing insidiously since the 1980s but had long been neglected, and that Edwin’s death was the tipping point as the Lun Bawang community was fed up by government inaction.
“It’s a 20-year-old problem. Most of our young boys are caught up in this. There have been small cases here and there but the police have not taken action.
“When it happens, people go ‘Where is the policeman?’” said the 40-year-old who is regarded as the go-to person on local culture, customs.
Balang described it as a long-standing problem involving vice and debt, but was unclear on the two communities’ roles in the situation.
Lawas and nearby Limbang were known as Sarawak’s sin capitals in the 1970s right up to the 1990s and saw prostitution dens, sleazy massage parlours and pubs mushrooming in town, which have been systematically cleaned up over the years.
But progress appears to have been impeded by allegations of widespread corruption, unresolved native land issues, a lack of basic infrastructure and breach of constitutional safeguards as contained in the 18-Point Agreement for Sarawak and the 20-Point for Sabah over the past decades.
Malaysia’s two easternmost states also rank among the country’s top three poorest states — Sabah’s overall poverty is the nation’s highest at 19.7 per cent, while Sarawak is third at 5.3 per cent, according to official statistics from the 2009 National Household Income Survey Report.
While police have beefed up their local presence with an extra platoon of General Operations Force and 45 more officers from Miri and Limbang and the streets of Lawas have quietened down, there is still a lingering sense of unease, Balang said.
“Yah, there are more police now. It is now very quiet. People are scared to go out,” he said.
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