MALAYSIA

Yet another fracas
centering around a dam: the
Malaysian government is
going ahead with its plans to
construct the Bakun hydro-
electric dam on the island of
Borneo. While the Deputy
Prime Minister Anwar
Ibrahim announced the
benefits of the dam in a seminar held recently on the project, the World Wide Fund
for Nature has demanded
that the authorities should
not proceed with the work
on the dam while negotiations with non-governmental organisations and
local communities were on.
Work on the dam and power
station is slated to begin in
May. A 650 km cable under
the South China Sea will
carry electricity from Borneo
to peninsular Malaysia. The
us $6 billion project on the
Rejang river tributary will
inundate 70,000 ha - an
area the size of Singapore
in the interior of Malaysia's
timber-rich Sarawak state on
Borneo island and displace
9,000 tribals. Environmental
activists said consultations
with local residents about
resettlement plans were
insufficient.