By Nur Ashikin Louis
KUCHING, May 24: A new Bill will be introduced to transform the Native Courts in the next Sarawak Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting, says Minister in the Premier’s Department Datuk John Sikie Tayai.
He said the State government in January 2020 commissioned a study to determine the current relevance of the Native Courts of Sarawak to meet the rising expectations of the stakeholders at today’s digitalisation and globalisation era.
“The Consultant which was appointed to undertake the study had submitted their final report in March this year. The outcome and recommendations therein will soon be presented to the State Cabinet for consideration and approval.
“One of the main recommendations to transform the Native Courts is to repeal the current Native Courts Ordinance 1992 and the Native Courts Rules 1993 with a new Native Courts Ordinance,” he said when presenting his winding up speech in the DUN sitting today.
Sikie further said the study was originally planned to be only a nine-months study. Unfortunately, it was not completed as scheduled in October 2020 following a delay due to Covid-19 pandemic.
Additionally, the State Development Office is currently implementing the upgrading of three native courtrooms at Pejabat Daerah Lingga, Pejabat Daerah Daro and Pejabat Daerah Kecil Medamit this year. — DayakDaily
