(Kuching, Jan 3) After 10 years of tireless promotion and vigorous struggle, coupled with the awakening and strong support of the people, the Sarawak Democratic Action Party (DAP) has successfully pressured the Sarawak government to drastically reduce land lease renewal fees and simplify the renewal process. This has made the current land policy more people-oriented and reasonable, saving the people a significant amount of money and making the land lease renewal process more convenient, benefiting the vast majority of landowners in Sarawak.
During an online interview with Fu Jinlong, the general coordinator of the City Castle Rotary Club's "Huayang" Magazine, Chong Chieng Jen was asked about what difficulties and obstacles he encountered in promoting social progress and community development, and how he overcame these challenges.
He revealed that in the early 2000s, many landowners faced issues with land lease renewals and were in distress. At the time, a major land issue faced by the people was the tenure of the lease. In Sarawak, many lands are leasehold lands, usually with terms of 60 years, 99 years, or 999 years. According to the land code at that time, if a land lease expired and was not renewed, the land would revert to the government, which would not need to compensate the landowner, and could then allocate the land to anyone.
"However, at that time, most people were not well aware of this clause and did not know the consequences of an expired lease. Moreover, the policy then stipulated that applications for renewal were only allowed within five years of the lease's expiration. Additionally, the renewal fees for extending the lease term were very expensive, making it hard for many landowners to afford. These unreasonable land policies were introduced during the strong period of the Sarawak United People's Party (SUPP)."
He gave an example: in urban areas, the renewal cost for terrace houses used to be 25% of the market value, amounting to tens of thousands of ringgit, while for shop houses, it was as high as 40%, equivalent to hundreds of thousands of ringgit, which was a heavy financial burden for the owners. Under this double whammy, many landowners not only couldn't afford the high renewal fees but also faced their lease expiring, leading banks to refuse their land mortgage transactions.
"During that time, SUPP not only didn't speak up for the house owners but strongly supported these unreasonable and unfriendly land policies."
Chong Chieng Jen stated that the Sarawak DAP launched a land policy campaign in 2001 and continuously stirred up the issue, pressuring the government to implement automatic lease renewal upon expiration and simplify the renewal process.
He disclosed that through the continual promotion of the land movement by the Sarawak DAP and the awakening support of the people putting pressure on the Sarawak government, breakthroughs were achieved after the Sarawak DAP won 6 seats in the 2006 state election and 12 seats in 2011, leading to the decline of SUPP. Ultimately, during a by-election in Sibu, the Sarawak government announced a new land lease renewal fee policy: terrace houses were uniformly charged 1,000 ringgit, semi-detached houses 3,000 ringgit, and detached houses 6,000 ringgit; shop houses were charged according to their town level at 40,000 (city shop houses), 20,000 (second-level town), and 10,000 ringgit (small town shop houses).
"Compared to the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of ringgit renewal fees that the Sarawakians were forced to pay during SUPP's strong period in the 2000s, the fees have significantly decreased, saving house owners gigantic renewal fees."
More gratifyingly, Chong Chieng Jen pointed out that the Sarawak government also refunded overpayments to homeowners who had paid high renewal fees before the implementation of the new land policy. This was the fruitful result of the Sarawak DAP's relentless push and vigorous struggle over a decade to enhance people's knowledge of property rights and awareness of land rights.
He admitted that the biggest challenge in promoting the land movement was how to enhance people's knowledge and awareness. Only when people understand the unfairness of the policy and unite can we force the government to compromise.
Thus, Chong Chieng Jen called on Sarawakians to continue supporting the DAP's work for the people's struggle, allowing the DAP to fight for the people's rights in the Sarawak Legislative Assembly, and emphasized that the DAP will continue to stand with the people and fight for fairer and more reasonable policies.
He stated that another challenge is how to maintain the sustained attention of social movements. An issue can easily lose public interest over time, so in promoting any social movement, it's necessary to continually keep the movement warm in new ways to maintain its heat until the ultimate goal is achieved. This requires long-term persistence and continuous innovation.