Taking a minute to email Protest action really does work!

I just received this email update regarding an email protest campaign that I participated in a while ago through an earth action network site. It worked!
Now we just have to make sure that the rainforest will be protected permanently with legislation, not just until the world's eyes are averted again.
I have found that adding your voice to email protest campaigns about the things that really concern you regarding human rights, the environment etc. really does help. Governments and authorities to listen to these things if enough people care.

That' why I use this blog to publish some of the issues that were brought to my attention that I have particpated in protesting against via email campaigns. I hope that you may find this interesting and useful!

You can send emails to the relevant authorities yourself. Ecological Internet's Earth Action Network have updated the original alert to commend Malaysian authorities for their restraint and to request that the Penan's last rainforested customary native lands be permanently protected and their land tenure permanently respected.

Unless we remain vigilant the blockade may yet be broken and bogus "certified" logging of much of the last 10% of Sarawak's ancient rainforests occur. The Penan communities are protecting their last contiguous rainforests from logging. Please stand with them now at:
http://www.rainforestportal.org/alerts/send.asp?id=penang


Pasted text follows below:

Thanks to a wave of international protests, the Malaysian authorities refrained from dismantling a logging road blockade set up by the Penan tribe in the interior of Borneo.

For more than two years, the Penan community of Long Benali (Miri division, Sarawak) has successfully prevented the bulldozers of the Samling group from encroaching onto their native customary lands.

The unmanned blockade was set up on 10 February 2004 to protect one of Sarawak’s last virgin jungle areas from logging. After timber company workers had dismantled a similar, newly established Penan blockade further downriver in June 2006, local authorities announced they would dismantle the Long Benali blockade by mid-July and brought specially trained police units into the area. However, the local community renewed the existing roadblock and appealed to the international public for support.

Penan headman: “Thank you for your support. Please don’t forget us now.”

Several international NGOs responded to the Penan’s cry for help and encouraged their members to send thousands of protest e-mails and letters to the Malaysian authorities and the appropriate logging companies. Particularly the US-based organizations, Rainforestportal.org and Global Response, as well as the UK-based Forest Peoples Programme and Survival International endorsed the Penan’s appeal.

Headman Sound Bujang of Long Benali expressed his appreciation for the international support: ”We are very proud to hear that so many people are on our side. This is strong encouragement for us to continue our struggle.”

Despite the temporary success, the Penan of Long Benali are afraid of what might happen in the coming months and are asking the international public not to forget them. They report that members of the neighbouring Kelabit community of Long Lellang had asked the Samling management to break the Penan’s resistance once and for all and to build a new logging road to Long Lellang by September 2006.

Embarrassment for Samling and Malaysian Timber Certification CouncilFor the Samling group, one of Sarawak’s timber giants, the situation is particularly embarrassing: the blockade is situated within an area for which the company has recently been granted a Certificate for Forest Management by the Malaysian Timber Certification Council MTCC. However, according to the latest MTCC report on the issue, “a large proportion of the Forest Management Unit is inaccessible to logging operations” due to the Penan blockade.

Now that more than ninety percent of Sarawak’s primary rainforests have been logged, the Penan communities are protecting their last contiguous parts from logging. The rainforests of Borneo are known to be one of the world’s most important biodiversity centers.