Stanley (right) speaks to an affected villager.
SIBU: A meeting will be called between the Sibu Resident’s Office and relevant departments to expedite action to remove a blockade across an access road in Tanjung Penasu, Igan.
District police chief ACP Stanley Jonathan Ringgit, who went to the area to monitor the blockade, said the relevant parties were already working to settle the matter amicably.
“We do not want the longhouse people to create unnecessary protests. Leave the matter to the relevant departments to handle,” he said.
Stanley said he had spoken to the longhouse chieftain, who had pledged to the longhouse folk on exercising restraint.
He quoted the longhouse chief as saying the land had changed ownership three times in the past decades.
It is understood that the previous landowners had allowed the road to be built on the land for longhouse folk to use.
“However, the new landowner reportedly demanded for compensation from the relevant parties for the road built on their land and that is why they set up the blockade after they did not receive the compensation,” Stanley explained.
The blockade comprising several concrete blocks laid across the two roads was apparently set up on Dec 2.
It has disrupted the lives of some 300 longhouse folk from the 51-door Rumah Jalak and 28-door Rumah Nita.