To be haunted is to glimpse a truth that might best be hidden.
— James Herbert, writer
Whether you like it or not, or want to deny it or not, logging is the biggest destroyer of the environment.
We all know it but cannot come to terms with the myth and reality that logging is good for regeneration of the forests and that the timber barons are helping preserve God’s green acre rather that bring about wanton destruction of our flora and fauna.
Thirty years ago, we still had half a dozen of rhinoceros while the last of the “Banteng” wild cattle was wiped out long before that.
Needless to say, the European anthropologists led the way in annihilation of the “Man of the Forest” — the gentle orangutan by example, through employing locals to help capture, kill and experiment on the primates to discover the origin of man.
Alfred Wallace Russel and Odoardo Beccari were the two biggest culprits as they went about their job in the Sarawak forests, thinking they were helping to discover the origin of man.
In the end and we know it, the beheading, skinning and studying of bottled orangutan foetuses is reminiscent of the rumour that Chinese hospitals sold and ate dead babies who are cooked and eaten as a delicacy.
Certainly, there is solid proof that the communists in Sarawak ate orangutan — not that they were hungry (there was ample wildlife in the remote forests where they took refuge) but perhaps as a delicacy.
The worst story is that of a terrorist leader who was fond of eating the cooked fleshy palm of captured orangutan.
According to a Special Branch report the leader, one “Hiu”, would cut off the hands of the primates and after carving out their meal, would let the animal go!
I admit that 30 years ago I was a recreational small-game hunter often using my .22 calibre rifle on birds and squirrels just for sport.
But my passion for killing the denizens of the forests stopped after I got lost in the forest of Semalatong in Simunjun for nine hours which the father of my old friend Sulok, swore was haunted.
Apai Sipi or the father of “Sipi” (Joseph Tawie) spoke of an incident when he ventured into the same forest and met an old man who invited him to his mahligai mansion where he spent several days.
When the search party found him, he was crouched in a small bush which in his mind was the palace of the forest guardian of the forest.
I too swear I came across such a bright and beautiful location in the jungle where butterflies flitted around in the glorious sunshine where I sat on a large log for a short rest after hours of walking around in circles.
Was this where Tawie stayed with the forest guardian?
Now I go back to the story of strict gun control that has taken its toll on the poor natives who depend on the wildmeat and jungle vegetables to have a sustainable diet.
Strict gun laws and the government’s policy restriction of cartridges — from unlimited ammunition 10 years ago to 10 per month — has not helped even though it is a well-known fact that there were 60,000 licensed shotgun owners in Sarawak.
Dr Julian Caldecott in “Hunting and Wildlife” (1988) wrote: “Many species of wildlife are declining in Sarawak for a variety of reasons connected with the opening up of the interior, in particular the logging industry.”
The destruction of fruit trees or plant species that provide food for wild boars and deer is one of the reasons. To compound it, overhunting by not only the natives but also timber company workers as well as commercial buyers of wildmeat has led to wildlife extinction.
Wild boars are the species mainly affected by logging through the loss of “feeding, breeding and travelling round” while deer like rusa and kijang have nowhere to hide, as logging roads have exposed their habitat such as salt licks, to hunters.
Also on the eating list are smaller animals such as pangolins, leopard cats, mousedeer, porcupines and argus pheasants and arboreal types including macaques, leaf monkeys, gibbons, proboscis monkeys, sun bears and the almost-extinct clouded leopards.
Sadly, logging activities stepped in the mid-1980s right through the 1900s and first decade of the new millennium forcing the late chief minister Pehin Sri Adenan Satem to put his foot down to ban illegal logging in 2014!
Short of warning the so-called “illegal loggers” he also warned the “Big Six” logging companies in Sarawak who were and still are the biggest destroyers of the last of our pristine jungles.
No doubt, logging and overhunting are synonymous but if we don’t stop the rot, these greedy timber barons will continue to revel in the forests in this shameful business.
Needless to say, remote communities such as the Penan have suffered the most because unlike the Iban, they don’t have an arsenal of shotguns and their blowpipes and spears can hardly provide their families with enough protein.
It’s time we continue with Tok Nan’s stand-up for the environment and put our foot down.
And say “enough is enough.”
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the New Sarawak Tribune.
