SABAH has abolished the communal title land scheme as the Warisan-led government move to keep election pledges to honour native customary rights.

Chief Minister Shafie Apdal today said the abolishment will benefit 13,789 beneficiaries from 96 communal titles across Sabah who will now be getting their individual titles instead of in a group under the communal scheme.

“The move will avoid problems such as overlapping claims in the future as the lands can only be inherited by their children,” he told reporters after attending a cabinet meeting today.

Shafie said the beneficiaries of 51 communal titles that have signed up numerous joint ventures with private firms and government linked companies will now have the option to re-negotiate the terms of the ventures individually, if they wished to do so.

“To note, these individual titles also cannot be charged, transferred or assigned. We don’t want the land owners to use their deeds as a collateral for a bank loan and what happened if they cant pay up one day.

“The land also cannot be transferred through the power of attorney except to the land owner’s children,” he said.

Shafie said further details on the new land scheme will be made known during the 100 days of Warisan-led government on August 21.

Various non-governmental groups had opposed to the issuance of a communal title introduced by the previous Barisan Nasional government led by Musa Aman.

According to Pacos Trust, the “communal titles” that was in­­troduced in the amendment deviated from their traditional territories concept which the indigenous people had known and practised.

A grave concern was that the government’s communal title had included outsiders while many of the natives living in the area were not listed. – August 8, 2018.