Soon after taking over from his predecessor, Abdul Taib bin
Mahmud, the new Chief Minister of Sarawak, Adenan Satem, made it clear he was
going to crack down on illegal logging. During the former Chief Minster’s
33-year rule, the state was regularly the subject of international criticism
for the widespread destruction of its rainforests and enormous sums of money
certain parties made from this.
While visiting London recently, the new Chief Minster
renewed his pledge to save the remaining forests and to fight timber
corruption. In his speech he told the audience, which included investigative
journalist Clare Brown, the founder and editor of the highly critical website,
Sarawak Report, that he was committed to a sustainable timber industry and would
work with all parties to achieve this.
The Malaysian Anti Corruption commission is now engaged in
ongoing activities to address the problem and recently announced it had
conducted another major offensive against illegal logging, raiding various log
ponds (where they store logs prior to milling), saw mills, and businesses. This
apparently resulted in them freezing several hundred bank accounts containing
some RM600 million as well as seizing logs to the value of RM1.5 million.
Even sceptics should now appreciate that action is finally
being taken to address this issue which has given Malaysia a bad name in the
international community.
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