Crackdown on forest dwellers sheer injustice
โพสเมื่อวันที่ 17 พ.ค. 2555 07:53 น. 

Amnuay Sangkaew believed her farmland in the Bantad mountain region of Trang province was finally safe from eviction threats now that her forest village is under the government's community land ownership programme.

How wrong she was!

Early last month, about 30 armed forest rangers stormed her Ban Haad Soong village on Bantad mountain to destroy the bridge that links the community to the outside world.

In desperation, Amnuay prostrated herself on the ground, tearfully pleading with them to stop, but to no avail.

She also tried to show them the documents from the Prime Minister's Office which certifies Ban Haad Soong as being under the government's community land ownership programme, which should protect it from all eviction efforts.

Again, to no avail.

It is clear. The constitution's endorsement of old forest communities' rights to land security is toothless.

Any government efforts to defuse land rights conflicts between the forest authorities and the villagers are only cosmetic.

Draconian forest laws still prevail. The crackdown continues unabated, and with increasing violence.

The mountainous forests are homes to 2,700 communities, where 1-2 million small farmers and indigenous peoples have lived for generations.

When these areas were declared protected forests 40 years ago, the forest dwellers were outlawed and subjected to forced eviction.

Nationwide resistance to the crackdowns resulted in the forest communities winning constitutional rights to stay in exchange for practising forest conservation and ecological farming.

But the evictions continued. In 2007-08 alone, nearly 10,000 villagers were jailed.

In response, grassroots movements fought for a community forest law to allow them to co-manage their forests. These efforts were frustrated by the forest agencies' fierce resistance.

When the Abhisit government acquiesced to the grassroots pressure that it give old forest communities the right to stay through community land ownership, forest authorities were burning with anger with the challenge to their central control.

But as soon as the Abhisit government left office, the forest crackdowns began again. Last year, Kaeng Krachan national park chief Chaiwat Limlikhit-aksorn evicted indigenous Karen forest dwellers by torching their huts and rice barns, and forcibly relocated them without giving them new land to live on.

This year, the crackdowns on communities in national parks have shifted to the Bantad mountain region, apparently to weaken the grassroots movement there.

Although Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation director-general Damrong Pidech said the targets are rubber plantations in forest areas, only those villages under the community land ownership programme are under attack.

The latest offensive took place on the Bantad mountain where officials destroyed shacks of small farmers and indigenous Sakai forest dwellers.

"Why are the forest officials staying away from the big rubber plantations. Why are they only attacking us poor people who were living here long before the forests became national parks?" said Kanya Pankiti, a villager-turned-land reform activist.

Why? Probably Kanya still does not understand the world view of the forestry mandarins. For them, the national parks under the care are their private empires. Tree farm plantations, even mining, are tolerated, even encouraged, because they increase their power, and wealth.

But if you ask them to tolerate challenges from the poor? No way.

When the Karen forest dwellers in Kaeng Krachan sought legal assistance from the National Human Rights Commission (NHCR) and the Lawyers Council of Thailand, officials launched more crackdowns to teach them a lesson.

The Kaeng Krachan park chief has filed criminal charges against the NHCR and the Lawyers Council for allegedly interfering with officials' work which he says encourages forest destruction.

He also filed a lese majeste charge against them for allegedly preventing his growing-food-for-elephants project, which he claimed to be a royal initiative.

"People cannot live in the forests," insisted Mr Damrong said. "It's wrong."

With his plan to recruit 2,000 officers to crack down further on forest communities, the violence is likely to continue, even though it is against the constitution. It is also a blatant injustice, and violence against the poor. When will it ever end?


Sanitsuda Ekachai is Assistant Editor, Bangkok Post.
Reference
http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/293653/crackdown-on-forest-dwellers-sheer-injustice