Ir. Karsan Sukardi, the Head of the Provincial Office of the Plantation Estates (Kepala Dinas Perkebunan) was fined by Pontianak City Dayak Adat chief. The public gathering for the adat and ritual ceremony of the Capa Molot (a name of the adat punishment or sanction) that applied to a person who insults harasses or abuses the others orally, and caused personal or social unrest) took place at Dayak Longhouse at Pontianak on Saturday Oct. 11 1997

This is the second time for the Dayak Indigenous Peoples in exercising their Adat Law to the government officer. In 1994, Aur Kuning Sub-District Police chief (Polsek Aur Kuning, Ketapang) was fined by the local Dayak elders after a group of weapon-equiped policemen sent to stop the demonstration held by local Dayak people against nearby operated timber company. The police Sector Head were then considered threatening the local people by bringing their arms and guns. This is considered taboo in Dayak Culture.

Several years ago a foreign researcher was also fined by Tumenggong Abraham Jelai, an Iban Adat Chief from Kapuas Hulu District. The researcher pointed out in a Seminar in Pontianak that the local Iban Dayak poisoned the Sentarum Lake in Kapuas Hulu which damaged of the fishes in the lake.

Karsan Sukardi was fined on the basis that he is considered insulting and harassing and abusing the Dayak farmers. In the press conference as quoted by local neswpaper Akcaya (Tuesday, Sep. 19) as saying, "The Provincial Office of Plantation Estates ignores that the forest fire that caused smog and haze is caused by the burning of plantation areas in the process of land clearing. Ir. Karsan Sukardi states that those plantation sites is burnt down because the local farmers' activity in burning the forest to open a dry paddy field (ladang). It is said that the community is become a scape-goat, but that is the reality." This is in contradiction with Presidents Soeharto,s statement as printed in Republika on Tuesday (Sep, 11), entitled:President: Forest Fire is not caused by Traditional Farmers".

A group of students called themselves as "Forum for Supporting President Soeharto’s Statement" held a demonstration on Sep. 20, 1997 (JP Oct. 6, 1997), at the office of West Kalimantan Plantation Estates. They request that Ir. Karsan Sukardi in his capacity as the Head of the Provincial Office for Plantation Estates withdraw his statement; that he has to resign from his present post; that those plantation companies should be brought to the court and; that the West Kalimantan local government should take a serious action to solve the haze problem.

Karsan meanwhile on the dialogue with the students on Monday Sep.29, refused the allegation. "I have no intention to insult and abuse the farmers. It is the reporter who interpreted my words. Therefore what I exposed is not exactly as what is written," he said.

On October 1, 1997 eleven Dayak adat chiefs and community leaders from various different areas of West Kalimantan went down to Pontianak. They met the Pontianak City Dayak Adat Chief Basirin. They are Timanggong (Banua Adat Chief) Miden Maniamas, Timanggong Nazarius and Acong Ngana (Kanayatn Dayak-Pontianak District), Petingi (Paramount Adat Chief) A. Aris and Dekka (Simpang and Krio Dayak-Ketapang District), Tumenggong Agustinus Malep and Rudy Ameng (Kotup Dayak and Desa dayak ,Sanggau) Enus Antang Ot Danum Dayak (Sintang District) and Tumenggong Abraham Jelai, an outstanding Kalimantan Iban Chief of Kapuas Hulu District.

These Adat Chiefs then gave a full mandate to Timanggong Basirin of the Pontianak City Dayak Adat Chief to sue Karsan in accordance to Kanayatn Dayak Adat Law.

"I went down spontaneously as I urged by my community after they read the statement of Ir. Karsan on Akcaya as well as the students demonstration," said Petingi Aris, a Simpang Dayak Adat Holder Council.

Tumenggong Jelai stated that the Dayak have been farming for centuries. But forest fire and haze is only happened in quite recent years. We know how to localize the fire, but people accused us of being wild cultivators (peladang liar). Its time for us to tell the public and the government that we are not doing so and we are not happy to be blamed as the scape-goat of their own engineered problems.

The Dayak Adat chief said that in Dayak Culture, a person who avoid to fulfill the adat obligations may be considered as ‘non-human’ and this may create wider social unrest. Therefore, the adat fined—in form of non-cash money and physical punishment—will restore the social, cultural and religious relationship that have been broken down by the wrong behavior of the person who is fined.

The record of West Kalimantan Provincial Office for Plantation estates shows that the total areas of the big scale plantation in West Kalimantan prior to the third semester of 96/97 is 233,233 hectares.

At the same time there have been 165 companies that were awarded the Principle Permission Letter and Area Reference Letter (Surat Pengarahan Lahan) from the Governor Office. Unfortunately only 80 companies who still hold the valid letters. Out of this figure 39 companies have been conducting the field physical activities, namely, land clearing, seedling and planting.

Some companies, as proved in their agreement letter with the contractors using "burning method" in the land clearing process. The other companies are made used of local farmers to farm in their referred areas before planting it.

West Kalimantan is a province which based its economic development on forest resources exploitation. The National Development Planning Board targeted economic growth of 10.9 % for the province, with total investment of Rp 32.826 billion. Some 20 percent will be provided by the government, while 80 % by private sectors. The biggest part of the investment will be on the Timber Industrial Plantation and Estate Plantation development.

Such gigantic development project schemes sometime are not in line with the interest of the local Dayak people. This in turn caused several conflicts with the local people.***(SD)

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***The word timanggong and tumenggung are used interchangeably, depends on the language of the local Dayak people.