The non-delivery, or the under-delivery, of development goods, usually occur
in resettlement schemes where Orang Asli frequently enjoyed such facilities
before they were asked to resettle. Thus, in the case of Kampung Busut and
Kampung Air Hitam, where KLIA now sits, these two communities enjoyed
all the basic infrastructure facilities and were no different than any modern
Malay village. However, it was at least three years after they moved to the new
resettlement scheme that water was piped in. In the meantime, they could not
grow their own crops because of the poor soil condition. And the promised
oil palm smallholding, or at least a portion of the promised acreage, was only
planted when the Orang Asli were into their 4th year of resettlement.
In the case of the Jahai in RPS Banun and the Temiar in RPS Kemar who had
to be resettled for the construction of the Temenggor Hydroelectric dam
25 years ago, it is ironic, yet not surprising, that no community there today
enjoys any of the electricity generated by the dam.
2.2.2
Health
The crude death rate for Orang Asli is twice that for all of West Malaysia (Ng
et al. 1992).4 In terms of women’s health, sex ratios for Orang Asli today, as in
the past, favour men; that is, the women die off at earlier ages (Department
of Statistics 1997). Orang Asli women have the highest recorded rates of
postpartum haemorrhage and puerperal sepsis, far above the rates for
other groups (Hema Apparau 2002).
In terms of infectious diseases, Orang Asli children in Perak have three times
the incidence of tuberculosis as the state average, and Orang Asli of all ages
have 5.5 times the state average (Jeyakumar 1999). Despite their very small
population size, Orang Asli had 51.5 per cent of the malaria cases recorded
in Peninsular Malaysia in 2001 (JHEOA 2005: 22). In 2003, this proportion
had increased to 53.6 per cent (JHEOA Gombak Hospital 2004).
For 1994, the leprosy rate for Orang Asli was 23 times higher than for others
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ORANG ASLI – RIGHTS, PROBLEMS & SOLUTIONS