Residents seek help

Residents seek help

BANDUNG: Hundreds of Tenjolaut and Cikalong villagers went to
the provincial legislature on Monday to protest alleged
intimidation by state-owned tea plantation company PTPN VIII
Panglejar in a land dispute.

The villagers, accompanied by several students, said they
could no longer stand the terror and intimidation which they
believed was being committed by a group of thugs hired by the
firm's management.

Spokesman for the group, I'ie, 50, said the terror began after
residents rallied at the National Land Agency for their rights
over a 195-hectare plot in the plantation on April 26.

The residents insisted that since December 1997 the firm no
longer held the license to till the land, so the plot should be
returned to them.

Another local, Mak Aning, 50, told the legislators that a
group of men attacked her house and threatened to kill her if she
refused to reveal where the students who helped the villagers
were from.

The terror peaked with the disappearance of Ubay Sudrajat
since April 28, the coordinator of the student solidarity
campaign for the Cikalong villagers. Police have so far been
unable to locate Ubay's whereabouts. (25/sur)