KUALA LUMPUR – The parents of seven Kelantan Orang Asli children who sued the government for negligence over their disappearance from their boarding school in 2015 will receive a RM1.41 million settlement.
Lawyer and Orang Asli activist Siti Kasim posted about the settlement at the Kota Baru High Court on Facebook today, adding that the settlement included costs.
The seven children from Pos Tohoi who studied at a boarding school further from their homes in the jungle went missing from their boarding school SK Tohoi in Gua Musang in August 2015. They had run away from the school into a nearby forest for fear of punishment after going swimming in a river without permission.
A 47-day search found the remains of five of the children and two of them – Norieen Yaakob, then 11, and Miksudiar Aluj, then 12, – alive but in a severely malnourished and weakened state.
The deceased children are Noireen's younger brother Haikal, 7, Ika Ayel, 9, Juvina David, 7, Linda Rosli, 8, and Sasa Sobrie, 8.
In 2018, their parents then filed negligence suits against the government, naming seven other defendants as the education director-general, the headmaster of SK Tohoi, the school’s warden, the rural development minister, the Orang Asli Development Department’s director-general, the inspector-general of police, and the Gua Musang district police chief.
The case brought to light the inadequacies of rural schools catering to Orang Asli children and reignited calls by the indigenous community for the government to build schools closer to their villages so that families need not send children far away to boarding schools.
Orang Asli rights advocates also raised the issue of cultural sensitisation for teachers posted to these schools.
The RM1.41 million settlement will be shared equally between the six families who are the plaintiffs, The Star reported Siti Kasim as saying. – The Vibes, July 24, 2023
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