For centuries the Penan tribespeople have lived peacefully in Borneo's rainforests. But they face a struggle for survival

Published on Thursday 23 April 2009 14:25

WHEN Robert Kilroy-Silk was packing for the Australian jungle and his stint in the most recent series of I'm a Celebrity…, the 'essential' extra he couldn't survive without was a pillow.

For disgraced butler Paul Burrell that item was a rubber ring (to sit on, apparently), Carly Zucker brought a yoga belt and Bobby Ball a pair of his signature red braces.

Closer to home, some of us couldn't get through the day without a morning blast of espresso, others would rather give up their right arms than surrender their Blackberries and you'd be asking any woman to survive without her mascara at your peril.

The concept of survival has different connotations for different people. But there are some living on this diverse planet we call home for whom the meaning is very literal indeed.

It is not war that is threatening the Penan people of Sarawak in Borneo, nor is it disease. It is trees. Or rather, the lack of them. Traditional hunter-gatherers, the Penan are still semi-nomadic and rely heavily on the forests around them for food and shelter. But a combination of aggressive logging, oil palm plantations and damming is destroying the habitat around them, exposing them to widespread hunger, hardship and displacement, and threatening their very existence.

More recently there have also been allegations by members of the Penan tribe of sexual abuse against women, including young girls, by workers employed by Malaysian logging companies, while peaceful protests by the Penan have led to arrests and allegations of police violence.

"Penan communities have spent more than 20 years trying to keep loggers off their land and to prevent the destruction of the forests they rely on," says Miriam Ross, 32, a campaigner from Edinburgh working for the charity Survival International. "Their resistance has had some success, and their peaceful blockades of logging roads have sometimes forced the companies to turn back. But many blockades have been dismantled and, according to the Penan, they have been subjected to repeated violence. The companies have the backing of the government so there is really not much the Penan can do."

Just back from Borneo, where she experienced at first hand what conditions are like for the indigenous people there, Ross adds: "It was terrifying to see the devastation of the Penan's land, and all the more so to know how quickly it is happening. I went to Penan communities where the loggers have taken so much of the forest the Penan have real difficulty finding food. You drive through vast areas that have very obviously been degraded, rivers are silting up, animals are disappearing and fish are dying.

"The Penan are on the defensive, forced to coexist with more powerful outsiders who are destroying their land, but on whom they must also rely for services such as transport of children to school. It is hardly surprising that women and girls feel vulnerable to sexual abuse by the workers of the invading logging companies."

The process is a devastating one, she explains. First loggers take the big, valuable trees, then smaller ones, then the area is completely clear-felled to make way for oil palm plantations. "The people say that's even worse than the logging because, at least when the land is logged there is some forest left and the people can hope that it might regenerate and some animals might come back. But when the plantations come in there are just rows and rows of oil palm trees and there is nothing left for the Penan.

"They are doing everything they can against tremendous odds, but there is no official protection for them and the isolation of these indigenous villages, which can be miles away from the nearest urban centre and only accessible by logging roads, makes them even more vulnerable."

The state of Sarawak was gifted to one James Brooke, a Briton, by the Sultan of Brunei in 1841, as thanks for his help in suppressing a local rebellion. Until 1946 it was run by three generations of the family, essentially as a private colony, with the Brookes, known as the White Rajahs, fighting piracy and slavery and setting up a secure government. On the centenary of Brooke rule the last rajah, Sir Charles Vyner Brooke, proclaimed a constitution aimed at establishing self-rule in Sarawak. However, not long after this it fell to the Japanese and following the Second World War it became a British colony. Since 1963 it has been part of Malaysia

The Penan people are not completely isolated – they have been in contact with the outside world for many years and some even wear western-style clothing. However, their lifestyle has remained largely unchanged for centuries. "They still go off in the morning with their blow-pipes and poison arrows to go hunting," says Ross. "Wild boar is their most prized catch. There're also various types of wild deer, wild cats, fish, frogs, snails. But in areas where the forest had already been logged they were saying they would be lucky to get one wild boar every three months.

"It's extremely difficult for them. Some of the Penan now farm small gardens where they'll grow rice or sometimes sago but, again, sago is something they'd usually have found in the forest."

So far, so bad, but a new threat could force the Penan out of the forest altogether – and into abject poverty on government-run reservations. "It was leaked on the internet last year that the Sarawak government is planning 12 new hydroelectric dams that will submerge the villages of the Penan," says Ross. "The first one has already been constructed and will affect several communities. They've been told they have to leave, which is disastrous for them. And if the other dams go ahead, other Penan communities and other indigenous people will also have to move to a government resettlement area. Here they will have a small area of land to farm that is completely insufficient and there will be absolutely no hunting.

"Also, because they are living in a house provided by the government, for the first time in their lives they will have bills to pay. Obviously the Penan living in their own areas wouldn't have to pay for their water – they get it from the river – and suddenly they have to earn money to pay for water and electricity.

"The people I spoke to said, 'We're not used to money, we don't know what to do with it. Here on our land everything is free.'"

During her visit, Ross, a history and politics graduate from Sheffield University, asked tribespeople if they wanted Survival International to campaign on their behalf. "They were all really keen for our help and for people in the outside world to know what was going on. They said, 'Our voices are small compared to the government and the companies.' They want help to make the Malaysian government listen to them before it is too late."

The most powerful thing we in the west can do, she says, is write letters to the government of Sarawak and to our own MPs to lobby for change – there are letter-writing forms on the Survival International website. "People could also join Survival, become a supporter and donate to help us continue our campaigning." It certainly helps put our own small hardships into perspective. As one Penan man told Ross: "The forest is like a bank for us. We're not like the people in the towns who have money and can buy things. The forest is our life. If we lose it and everything it gives us, we will die." r

To find out more and to start campaigning to help the Penan, see www.survival-international.orgRAINFOREST DIARYFebruary 21

MY BONES shake as we drive along unmade roads cut by loggers through the rainforest. We swerve to avoid the logging trucks, piled high with massive tree trunks, as they thunder by in clouds of dust.

After the road peters out my guide and I walk an hour and a half on a path through the forest to reach the village. Bridges made of single tree trunks straddle gullies, and I nearly topple into a stream three metres below, wobbling with the weight of my rucksack.

Finally, at the bottom of the valley, we find a collection of neat wooden houses on stilts, and a family who are happy to take us in. The house has one room with a hearth in the corner, and a veranda with purple flowers trained over it.

I am soon surrounded by an entourage of small children, and join them splashing around in the river that runs beside the village.

In the evening I meet the village elders, dressed in their best clothes for the occasion.

February 22

When I wake, the mist is clinging to the sides of the mountains. I'm sleeping on the floor, and my host family is curled up under a blanket.

Breakfast is rice from the family's small field, and meat from the hairy black animal our host Galak caught last night. I'm not sure what I'm eating. Food is fairly plentiful here. The Penan also eat venison, fish, frogs, snails, ferns, sago, all sorts of fruit, and the prized wild boar.

"Good morning, go to hunting." Galak's neighbour is heading off into the forest with his wooden blowpipe. No Penan man will travel through the forest without one.

March 4

We arrive at a small settlement in an area further to the north that has already been heavily logged. Instead of big old trees, the remaining forest is clogged with low secondary undergrowth, and most of the wild animals have gone.

The Penan here live in shelters made of tree branches and tarpaulins, and spend a lot of time in the forest away from this main camp, looking for food.

Jeffrey, the young leader of this settlement, arrives in the late afternoon with his brother-in-law and five or six boys. They've been out hunting with blowpipes. The children have all wrapped leaves round their foreheads and look like they've been playing a great game. But this is also real life, and they've caught nothing.

March 6

Down the road at the next Penan settlement, most people are away in the forest. One side of their steep valley was logged years ago. The other side is still covered in old forest, but the loggers are only just over the ridge. You can hear the distant roar of their bulldozers.

Pisang, I'm told, is the man I need to speak to, but he mostly stays deeper in the forest. I don't blame him – the valley is so beautiful in the moonlight tonight that I don't want to go to bed. Nor do the Penan – they chat softly by their cooking fire late into the night.

March 7

Pisang had heard we were here and came back to the settlement late last night. He's strong and stocky with bright eyes. "I went up to the ridge last week to tell the workers to stop logging," he says. "They told me, 'This is a government project. If you fight us, we'll kill you.' So I'm really asking you to help us protect this bit of forest, or we will have nothing to eat. Our voices are too small for the companies to hear."