Tan Sri Simon Sipaun, SUHAKAM

His two elder sisters died when they were just babies and he was lucky to survive his childhood in rural Sabah, battling malaria, beriberi and skin diseases. His subsistence-farming parents would have two more children – only one would live past infancy.

“Life was very tough. My family’s survival rate of two children out of five was typical of the time because of the very poor living conditions and the malnutrition,” says Tan Sri Simon Sipaun, Vice Chairman of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (SUHAKAM).

Born seventy years ago to ethnic Kadazandusun parents, his family made a meagre living by growing vegetables and raising chickens and buffalo.

“My parents were illiterate and had it not been for the mission schools, I would still be illiterate today,” said Sipaun. He excelled at school and was awarded a number of academic scholarships, which took him to New Zealand and then Oxford University in the 1960s, before returning to Sabah to work in the civil service.

While he would go on to hold a number of senior government roles, including the position of Sate Secretary for Sabah, promoting and protecting the rights of indigenous Malaysians would remain one of his chief concerns – a focus that he has brought to his current role at SUHAKAM.

“Indigenous communities in Malaysia today are still very much marginalised. Compared to the rest of the population, they lag behind on every standard: health, income, education,” he says.

“They are mainly born in rural areas and start life in a vicious cycle of poverty. If you are poor, you cannot afford good health care, good food or to go to a good school. You start behind everyone else and your life is likely to end earlier than the rest of the population.”

While there are a complex range of issues that contribute to this situation, Sipaun believes land ownership, and the economic, social and cultural benefits that flow from it, is a key means by which indigenous communities in Sabah, Sarawak and Peninsular Malaysia can overcome their entrenched disadvantage.

“If you can show evidence to the government that you have lived on certain land and developed the land over a period of time, then you can claim customary right to that land,” he says.

“Yet when they apply to the authorities for customary ownership of their land, generally the response is one of rejection. However, when the palm oil companies come in, they seem to have no problem acquiring the same land. So it is a very pitiful case.”

Earlier this month, following the International Day for Indigenous People, SUHAKAM announced that it would bring together concerned parties for a roundtable discussion on the proposed construction of 12 hydroelectric dams in Sarawak.

SUHAKAM said its main concern with the project was the displacement of Indigenous communities from their traditional lands and the impact on their livelihoods.

It also released a major report, ‘Legal Perspectives on Native Customary Land Rights in Sarawak’, which included a number of recommendations to government to strengthen the protection of customary land rights.

Since the establishment of the SUHAKAM’s regional office in Sarawak in 2000, a total of 158 of the 287 complaints it has received have related to native customary rights to land.

“This is where SUHAKAM can make a positive difference for Indigenous communities. We talk with them, find out the root cause of their problems and then draw the attention of the authorities and other decision makers,” says Sipaun.

“We not only tell the government of their problems but we also make very clear suggestions about what should be done by the government to honour their commitments to indigenous communities.”