Pre-colonial legitimations of post-colonial claims

The current population of the Bukit Duabelas area traces back their origins at least to the founding of this Islamic sultanate Jambi Melayu II in the 15th century. By that time, Jambi was inhabited by different “suku” or “bangsa” (ethnic or cultural groups), following their own customary laws, adat (Locher-Scholten 2004: 48). Adat does not only regulate the social interaction within society, but also the use and belonging of natural resources and land tenure. Settlements were found along the nine main rivers and their tributaries determining Jambi’s infrastructure until the 21st century. The sultans’ court was settled at the Batang Hari River. Along this central river and its larger tributaries were the territories (kalbu) of the so called Bangsa Duabelas – the twelve people (see map 2)

48Efforts have been made by the forest department to resettle the Orang Rimba from the park area.

C h a p t e r 6 : S e p a r a t i n g s i s t e r s f r o m b r o t h e r s 84

Map 6: Villages and rivers in the research area around 1900, Source: Hagen 1908

The Bangsa Duabelas hold genealogical ties with the Sultan’s court since the 15th century and due to their common descents, the Bangsa Duabelas formed what the Dutch later called

“genealogical adat communities” (genealogische rechtsgemeenschappen, Haga 1928). They were distinguished by the Dutch from the “territorialized adat communites” (Haga 1928) which do not hold kinship ties with the ruler’s court and are not of common descent.

The Bukit Duabelas area was part of the Bangsa Duabelas´ territories and Air Hitam was ruled by a line of queens - descendants of the sultan’s sister. Land was allocated to the residents for communal use and borders between village communities were defined by the hearing distance of a gongs sound (Nasruddin 1989). Land could not be owned privately, neither be sold nor bought. The inhabitants of Air Hitam were responsible to deliver firewood from the forest that today is the Bukit Duabelas National Park to the Sultan’s court due to their kinship ties.

The Orang Rimba were part of these complex socio-political structures in different ways:

They were never direct subjects of the sultan, but they maintained economic relations with the ruler’s middlemen, called jenang, and with the more sedentary Melayu population around them. The Orang Rimba also claim genealogical bonds with the sultans ruling dynasties. With the local elites, the Orang Rimba maintained a patron-client relationship that

C h a p t e r 6 : S e p a r a t i n g s i s t e r s f r o m b r o t h e r s 85 lasts until the present day. This patron-client relationship is as well derived by kinship relations between the Orang Rimba and the village population:

The Orang Rimba, like the sedentary Malayu, combine matrilinearity with uxorilocal residence patterns and with matrilineal inheritance structures of land, forest and tree tenure.

In case of divorce a man returns to his sister’s place as she is held responsible for her brothers living. According to local lore, villagers and Orang Rimba are common descendants of a pair of siblings once living in the forest. The pair parted and one continued to live according to the forest laws (see left side of the figure) whereas the other settled in a village (see right side of the figure). The Orang Rimba are regarded as progeny of the female sibling, hence they are obliged to perform their respective duties in the patron-client relationship with the villagers conceptualized as descendants of the male lineage.

Figure 4: Kinship relation between Orang Rimba and Melayu villagers, own data

C h a p t e r 6 : S e p a r a t i n g s i s t e r s f r o m b r o t h e r s 86 Far-reaching administrative and juridical changes came with Dutch colonial rule in the first half of the 20^th century. During colonial administration, the territories called kalbu were mutually divided and merged into 30 districts.

Apart from political restructuring, the Dutch introduced western concepts of nature-culture dichotomies turning socio-cultural landscapes into empty spaces and exploitable resources.

Additionally, European concepts of property were applied and all, especially forested areas that did not show signs of agricultural cultivation to the Dutch, were declared as property of the state (Domein Verklaring) (Biezeveld 2004: 140). Dutch colonial rule replaced kinship based socio-political structures and land tenure systems with concepts of citizenship and legal frameworks based on ideas of the European nation state which should provide the basis for further resource exploitation and dispossession of the local population after Indonesian independence.

Following the Indonesian independence in 1945, another juridical and political reorganization changed the local rights of (forest) resource use, land tenure and conceptions of communal ownership (tanah adat, hutan adat, hutan lindung, etc.), when the 1967 Forestry Law was implemented.

The exploitation of Indonesia’s “natural resources” must be seen in connection with Suhartos politic of nation-building and national development. This development was aimed at economic growth and guidance to development for the population as a project of rule (Barr 2006: 23; Rachman 2011: 43).

In 1979, a governmental decree⁴⁹ again restructured the political and social organization of the population in the Bukit Duabelas region. The former village entities, called “dusun” or

“kampung”, were turned into so called “desa” and given new political structures, hierarchies and institutions that should formally replace the customary structures and laws of adat (Warren 1990: 24). The villages in the district of Air Hitam were allocated communal land, village boundaries were defined and resident identity cards were issued. Even though the village borders did not match with the communities former territorial claims, the act of

49 Republik of Indoensia 1979, Undang-undang Republik Indonesia No.5 Tahun 1979 tentang Pemerintahan Desa, http://www.keuangandesa.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/UU-No-5-Tahun-1979-Tentang-Pemerintahan-Desa.pdf

C h a p t e r 6 : S e p a r a t i n g s i s t e r s f r o m b r o t h e r s 87 village constitution finally turned the village residents into acknowledged citizens of the Indonesian nation state.

In contrast, forest dwelling groups like the Orang Rimba were defined as traditional remote communities (Komunitas Adat Terpencil - KAT) (DEPSOS 2003). These groups along the equitation – forest dwelling, nomadic, shifting cultivation = remote, uncivilized, backward - occupied the “tribal slot” (Li 2000) and were described as isolated from development and progress (Saudagar 2002: i) by Indonesian governmental institutions. The Social Department of Jambi stated that there is a “big gap and much difference in the aspects of value system between [the Orang Rimba] and local socio-culture” (Depsos 2003:10).

The Orang Rimba now were categorically isolated of the social structure of the Bukit Duabelas area and turned into a minority group deprived of any rights. State policies and national legislation transformed local kinship based socio-political structures and land tenure systems into administrative categories of citizenship and codified legal rights. The Orang Rimba, like other communities all over Indonesia, became the constituting “other” of the modern Indonesian villager and citizen. But in the end, both groups, the Orang Rimba and local villagers have been equally deprived of their customary land tenure by the nation state.