Working hard to improve the communities

Translation of article published in Asahi Shimbun Japan 1.1.2010

Community Organiser in various places

To encourage the people to seek a solution to the poor and promoting human rights issues.

The activity called “community organizing” is becoming popular in various places. It makes the local residents tackle social problems such as poverty and also to resolve those problems by themselves. More and more attention is being paid to the concept of micro communities especially in European Union countries or “East Asia Communities”. In the USA since the period of a civil rights movement in history established networks that spread slowly in the other regions in the world.

Photo: Mr.Tan Jo Hann(left) discuss with residences front of the longhouse.

The “Longhouses” of Jinjang Utara is located in the suburb capital city Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Toward the end of December, community organiser, Mr. Tan Jo Hann (age 47), President of PERMAS, spoke to some women with their children. One of them sighed “When can I get out from this area?”

Malay, Chinese and Indians are living this area which has a total population of 10,000 people. In this area many children who have stopped school become a juvenile delinquency, unemployed or turn to drugs and alcohol. This place is like a place for social failures among poor people.

In 1970s to 1980s, Kuala Lumpur had many young workers from the outskirts who went to the towns to look for jobs and a better life. In the beginning of 1990s, they got ordered out because of the redevelopment. The government promised them permanent low cost house for the lower income group. But they have not got the confirmation letter from the government about their promised houses even until now.

Mr. Tan started to work with this area in the mid 1990s. He encouraged residents to discuss among themselves and gradually organized them to struggle for their demands for permanent housing and to improve the quality of their lives.

“The main actors are residents and we just support them. Our role is to pass on our knowledge and experiences to the people, so-call ‘empower them”. Sometimes, he had to confront bulldozers from property developer companies wanting to forcibly evict these people.

He was born into a Chinese family in Ipoh a small town in the middle of Malaysia. He is a Christian. When he was a high school student, he thought “why poverty exist?” Why is it that even with Christian church providing services to the poor but still they exist and he could not find an answer.

After he graduated from high school in the 1980’s he met some experienced “Community Organisers” and became a member of a group of 14 community organizers people. They were from different backgrounds working as an employee, a factory worker, a teacher or journalist and other professions. They actively organize the slum areas while working in their usual jobs.

Under the former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad’s administration, the government employed very strict control on activities which seemed to be against the government. That time when Mr. Tan joined the group he was also restricted by the authorities and police. The group members were sometimes hiding from the Government and Mr. Tan went to University of Philippines to study. In 1993, he came back to Malaysia and re-started his activities especially in the poor housing issues.

Mr.Arumugam is a taxi driver and lives in a longhouse. He is under the guidance of Mr. Tan. Now, Mr. Arumugam is self-reliant and became active as “a local organizer”. He would discuss with local government about the community issues such as resolving the public bus transportation system and they were also successful.

Mr. Tan is one of the founders of a network group “SEAPCP” (South East Asia Popular Communications Programme) which links up organisers in the SEA region. To date Mr. Tan has trained and developed more that 60 organisers in Malaysia as well as overseas. “Now ordinary people can confidently discuss with government ministers on an equal footing. I am glad to see them being changed” he said.

As Asian country economies grow in the region, community organisers are increasingly needed to develop the consciousness of the people.

By Mr. Tsukamoto at Kuala Lumpur

ASAHI SHIMBUN, JAPAN