ENGKILILI: Native Customary Rights (NCR) landowners were advised not to drag the problems of the land boundaries disputes to the court.

According to Lubok Antu Member of Parliament William Nyalau Badak, matters get worse when they reach the court simultaneously with survey of the land by the Land and Survey Department.

“Disputes between landowners which have been brought to the Mahkamah Adat Bumiputera or Native court will take years to settle as the losing party will certainly make appeal and this would certainly take some time before any solution could be reached. 

“I am well aware of such problem because I have been there as a presiding magistrate in the court previously. That is why we need to settle it by ourselves,” he said.

Nyalau who officiated at the function as well as attending the dialogue yesterday said that the opposition always used such issue to hinder the government effort in recognising the NCR land ownership by the people.

“Last time when we did not measure the NCR lands they (opposition) claimed we wanted to take the land. Now when the government wants to do new initiative for NCR they still also say the same thing.

“They should realise the land owned by the people could not be taken anyhow or easily, hence I hope the people would realise that when the opposition said such issue is actually to garner political support from the people,” he said.

During the ceremony Nyalau handed over a cheque amounting RM63,000 to the community as allocation for various projects.

Nyalau also officiated at the handing over flag ceremony to the futsal contingent which will be going to Putrajaya, Kuala Lumpur to compete in a compet ition to be held there.

(Source : New Sarawak Tribune, 19 January 2012)