Back in 2008 as a response to wanton land clearing , the State Government to its credit came up with this ruling. One would have thought that with this , illegal land clearing would be more manageable. But the opposite happened.
Looking back, how can the opposite not happen with so many “ wolves in sheep’s clothing” at the local Land Office? An equivalent proverb in Malay would be “ harapkan pagar, pagar makan padi”. It was during this period that the word “ Flying TOLs” or “TOL Terbang” was coined.
In accordance with the Land Conservation Act 1960, farmers in Cameron Highlands were given TOL or Temporary Occupation License to work their land .Most of these TOL’s were for 2 acres or slightly more for a period of 1 year to be renewed annually. However farmers tend to farm more than their stipulated area and most of these would be adjacent to their original plot. Back then there were still land which were below 25 degrees gradient and deemed suitable for farming. However by the Year 2005 onwards these suitable areas were mostly used up and that was when the State Government came up with the above ruling.
For earth works to commence land clearing permits have to be issued first. Land clearing permits have to be referenced to a particular TOL and can only be issued by the Land Administrator and the top ranking Land Administrator in Cameron Highlands is the District Officer.)
Now assuming all the old TOLs were used up and no new TOLs issued , then there should logically be no new land cleared for farming. But instead there was an explosion of them mainly in Kampung Raja, Kuala Terla and Manson Valley. Most of these , would have what appeared to be proper land clearing permits .On closer inspection these land clearing permits were found to be suspicious as they have been referenced to fraudulent TOLs. They have been referenced to old recycled TOLs from elsewhere which explains why even when no new TOLs were being issued, new land clearings took place. These are the flying TOLs of Cameron Highlands. Corrupt land officers are laughing themselves silly. As the years passed and they were not apprehended they have gotten bolder and lately have stooped so low as to issue land clearing permits in the water catchment areas.
How can one know that the TOLs are fraudulent? TOL numbers come in sequence and these new land clearings have TOLs that are not in sequence. They are usually from other villages and one can find Ringlet TOLs ending up in Kampong Raja etc. The usage of these flying TOLs as a modus operandi is an open secret. Meanwhile some poor farmer coming to renew his TOL the following year will find his file missing. His TOL had literally been ripped off from his file to be reused elsewhere. This is Cameron Highlands.
( A local contractor had been heard to boast. “ Saya boleh tolak hingga puncak bukit kerana saya ada sepuluh TOL layang.” “ Boleh ke buat macam tu ?” “ Di Cameron Highlands, asalkan ada duit, semua boleh”
So if an ordinary Cameron Highlander know that a flying TOL is fraudulent, how can the State Land Administrators not know about them. All they need to do is to check them with the master TOL list in Pejabat Tanah dan Galian Kuantan and question the person whose signature is on the Land clearing permit.
Was there no political will? Were the people in authority in cahoots with the perpetrators? Were the people in authority controlled by someone else? Is corruption so ingrained in our society that it is part of our culture now? The end result is the state of Pahang is losing its valuable natural resources, its revenue from other sustainable sources of income such as ecotourism while Cameron Highland is suffering from a shortage of water and the water catchment areas contaminated. Pesticdes used for farming are all around us, in our air, our water and our soil. Flash floods and landslides are the norm.
Menteri Besar Adnan Yaakob, what have you got to say? On land issues in Pahang, the buck stops with you.
Ramakrishnan Ramasamy, President of Reach