KOTA KINABALU, Jan 10 — Sabah Land and Survey Department (JTU) has set a target to conduct survey works on 17,000 hectares of Native Customary Rights (NCR) land through the Sabah Native Land Services (PANTAS) and Communal Grant programmes this year.
Its state director Datuk Safar Untong said 80 survey teams are involved in carrying out the work on the NCR land or land that had been inhabited and occupied by the natives since time immemorial.
“The two programmes (PANTAS and Communal Grant) are initiatives of the state government in collaboration with the federal government aimed at expediting the application process of Sabah NCR land.
“Through the Budget 2018, the government has allocated RM20 million for NCR land mapping and survey works in Sabah and the allocation will provide continuity and ensure these two programmes are carried out smoothly,” he told Bernama.
Safar said since PANTAS was introduced in 2011, some 21,378 land lots with a total acreage of 36,137.02 hectares involving 92 villages throughout Sabah had been surveyed since December 2017.
Under the Communal Grant programme, he said 73 communal grants were processed and ready to be issued involving 217 villages in 12 districts with a total acreage of 122,048.03 acres (49,405.64 hectares) up till December 2017 since it was introduced in 2011.
“During that period, 10,636 Sabah native household heads benefited from the communal grants and for last year alone the survey of four communal grants were completed with a total area of 5,568.10 hectares,” he said.
Communal grants are similar to NCR grants except that these are bigger because the land application is made in groups with the names of applicants listed in the grant.
Meanwhile a villager of Kampung Tampasak Babagon, Bianis Gampi, 60, was confident he would benefit from the PANTAS programme in the expediting of the land title application involving his late grandfather’s NCR land of about 15 acres (six hectares).
Sharing the same sentiment, Alex Kalidin, 35, from Kampung Maukab, Ranau said the PANTAS programme was a government initiative that should be commended and received well by the natives in Sabah.
“I understand that Sabah JTU has deployed two survey teams full-time in my village (Kampung Maukab) which is the first to benefit from PANTAS in Ranau district and under the programme, I will obtain a land grant of about five acres (2 hectares),” he said.
He also expressed his gratitude to the government, especially Sabah JTU and State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun for selecting his village for the PANTAS programme in Ranau, where the populace are mostly from the Dusun community and other indigenous people. — Bernama
