‘Dayak’ term not recognised by Sarawak Govt

“The terms Bumiputera Iban, Bumiputera Bidayuh etc are also incorrect as there is no such term as Bumiputera in the Ordinance.”

KUCHING: The Interpretation Ordinance 2005, originally a colonial piece of legislation, stands in the way of the Sarawak Government recognising the term “Dayak” for inclusion in government forms and official documentation.

Kota Sentosa Assemblyman Chong Chieng Jen feels the way out would be to amend the Ordinance which was last updated in August 2005. Chong, who is also Bandar Kuching MP and DAP Sarawak chairman, is pushing for this to be done during the forthcoming Sarawak Assembly sitting in May.

“Under the Ordinance, there is officially no such race as ‘Dayak’ in Sarawak,” pointed out Chong. “The provisions in the Interpretation Ordinance 2005 do not provide for labelling the Dayak as Dayak Iban, Dayak Bidayuh etc.”

“The terms Bumiputera Iban, Bumiputera Bidayuh etc are also incorrect as there is no such term as Bumiputera in the Ordinance.”

He was commenting on the current controversy generated by the Sarawak Government’s decision that the Orang Asal would, in future, be referred to as Bumiputera Iban, Bumiputera Bidayuh, Bumiputera Orang Ulu and Bumiputera Melanau in official forms. The Lain-Lain (others) category, reserved for them in the past, would be done away with.

The Orang Asal, however, want to be called Dayak and in the fine print, Dayak Iban, Dayak Bidayuh etc. They are against the term Bumiputera being used in Sarawak on the grounds that they know that as Orang Asal they are Bumiputera (sons of the soils) and don’t want the term attached to their ethnic labels.

Chong called on Dayak leaders to recognise that merely mentioning Dayak in government forms would by itself be insufficient as it would have no legal status. “The right thing to do is to amend the Ordinance,” he reiterated.

Under the Ordinance, indigenous races in Sarawak are Bidayuh or Land Dayak, Bukitan, Bisayah, Dusun, Iban or Sea Dayak, Kadayan, Kelabit, Kayan, Kenyah (including Sabup and Sipeng), Kajang (including Sekapan, Kejaman, Lahanan, Punan, Tanjong and Kanowit), Lugats, Lisum, Malay, Melanau, Murut or Lun Bawang, Penan, Sian, Tagal, Tabun, Ukit as well as any admixture of these races with one another.

All these ethnic groups, including Sarawak Malays, can be covered by the term “Dayak”, something resisted by the Malays and some Melanau, the latter split among Christians, Muslims and pagans.

The Sarawak Malays are actually mainly Bidayuh and Iban living along the coast who converted to Islam. The Brookes called them Malays after the fashion of the British in the peninsula who codified the term “Malay” to cover Muslims – Bugis, Javanese, Minang, Acehnese and others – who used Malay, the lingua franc in the Archipelago, to communicate with each other.

Unlike in Sabah, a mixture of one of the groups in the Sarawak Ordinance with another group not listed, would not be considered by the Native Court as Orang Asal. In reality, the National Registration Department (NRD) would accept the issue of an Iban father and a Chinese mother, for example, as Iban but not if it was vice versa. The latter case would be referred to the Native Court.