By CHRISTINE CHEAH
alltherage@thestar.com.my

IN the middle of the hilly region around Kampung Genting Peres, surrounded by dense forest, lies a football pitch.

It’s not much – there’s ironically not a single blade of grass on it, just sand – but it’s the only place where the young people of the village can gather to play football.

And it’s all thanks to an initiative by the Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights (MCCHR), called UndiMsia!’s Adopt-the-Street. The MCCHR came up with the idea to create a recreational space for the orang asli community of Kampung Genting Peres, located on the foothill of Mount Nuang in Hulu Langat, Selangor, and what better place can there be for recreation than a football pitch?

Not yet Wembley: The recently built football field at Kampung Genting Peres in Hulu Langat, Selangor, was funded by the European Union (EU) and Dusun Tua state assemblyman Razaly Hassan in an approach to engage the indigenous people.

MCCHR then requested funding from the European Union (EU) as well as Dusun Tua state assemblyman Razaly Hassan, who were more than happy to help. The funding from the EU, in particular, came from its own initiative to engage local youth based on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People.

The EU’s delegate to Malaysia, counsellor Marcel Roijen, attended the launch of the field and said the main objective of their support was to enhance ownership and the rights of indigenous youths, as well as to provide them with voter education.

“Our efforts here are to support and establish the democratic rights of the orang asli, and my presence is to ensure that they participate in deciding Malaysia’s future,” said Roijen.

Roijen, who hails from Netherlands, then asked the crowd of young people through a translator how they felt a football pitch will help them achieve those objectives.

“From where I come from, bringing a community together in a rural area starts from a football pitch. (The football pitch) is the most unimportant of all things, but football itself is important,” he said.

EU delegation to Malaysia, counsellor Marcel Roijen (left) and Dusun Tua state assemblyman Razaly Hassan were present for the launch and they discussed the welfare of the indigenous people and efforts to improve their living conditions.

Despite being all dressed up in his suit and tie under the hot tropical sun, Roijen then took to the pitch himself to have a little kick-about with the locals, joined by Razaly and representatives from MCCHR.

Razaly, who is a first-term assemblyman, assured the villagers that he would try to obtain funds to layer the field with grass. “A field wouldn’t be called a field if there isn’t any grass.”

The original plan, of course, was to lay the pitch with grass, but they had to shelve that plan due to the recent drought. The new plan is to do it during the next monsoon season, where the rain will ensure the grass grows well.

That won’t be the end of Razaly’s contribution, though. He said he hopes to provide more facilities for the villagers in the near future.

However, according to Razaly, engaging the orang asli does involve some red tape, especially with the Orang Asli Affairs Department.

“Whatever events or facilities provided to the indigenous people has to be approved by the relevant authorities, and that complicates things, but we will still try to reach out to them,” he said.

MCCHR project officer Mazni Ibrahim, who was put in charge of the project, said it was just the first step for the organisation in its attempts to reach out to the indigenous people. “We want to empower the youth within their own community. This is just a small effort, with hopes of more to come.”