GOMBAK HOSPITAL, THE ORANG ASLI HOSPITAL

Abstract

Gombak Hospital is a paradox for the Malaysian government. As the only government-run hospital for the Orang Asli, the indigenous minority of Peninsular Malaysia, this discrete medical service seems to contradict the government's policy of Orang Asli assimilation. This article explores the development of the Hospital and the Medical Division of the Department of Orang Asli Affairs, from its inception during the Emergency (1948–1960) when it formed part of the British hearts and minds campaign, to today in the climate of indigenous assertion. The historical detail is drawn from newly sourced primary material, particularly the unpublished diaries of Dr J. Malcolm Bolton. The medical service for the indigenous peoples of the peninsula is compared to the services in Sabah and Sarawak, where treatment of indigenous communities is incorporated into the wider rural healthcare services. The paradox of assimilation versus indigenous assertion dominates the provision of healthcare at Gombak Hospital and reflects the place of Orang Asli within contemporary Malaysia.

Notes

¹I am grateful to Malcolm Bolton and his sister Barbara Richmond for allowing me unprecedented access to his diaries. After Bolton's death in 2006, his diaries were deposited at Rhodes House in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

²Sourcing reliable statistical data on the Orang Asli remains difficult and figures quoted should be regarded as indicative and not accurate. The JHEOA's census enumerates only the settlements and communities that come under its administration. The national census does not record Orang Asli separately from Malays, but brackets them together under the label bumiputra. The 2004 data I present is the most up-to-date statistics available. The 2005, 2006 and 2007 data has not yet been officially authenticated and the JHEOA have remained unable to provide me with more recent population figures.

³See Hooker (1978: 172–85; 1996) and Rachagan (1990) for detailed discussions of the legal and constitutional position of the Orang Asli in Malaysia, and Nah (2006) for a summary of the historical background to issues of their indigeneity.

⁴Malay ruling class ideas about the Orang Asli, the impression that they are backward, lazy and harbour negative, even deviant traits, are derived, in part, from notions of the Sakai. It was never a term of self-reference and is inherently pejorative. Repeatedly they were referred to by comparison with the dominant population and there emerged an assumption, still in evidence today, that the Sakai represented an early stage of Malay development, a pre-civilised society that had not yet progressed into the modern era. For comparison with the Australian colonies and their relations with aboriginal Australians see McGregor (1997).

⁵McFaddon (2005) goes so far as to argue that lessons learnt from the British success in the Malayan Emergency should be incorporated in the development of America's Joint Interagency Task Force to combat the threat of Al-Qaeda inspired terrorism. See also ‘After smart weapons, smart soldiers’ (Economist, 25 October 2007).

⁶These figures were obtained from the Tuberculosis and Leprosy Control Unit in the Disease Control Division of the Malaysian Ministry of Health.

⁷Figures based on the 2000 Population and Housing Census of Malaysia. For details refer to the Department of Statistics Malaysia <http://www.statistics.gov.my> and the World Fact Book of the Central Intelligence Agency <http://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/my.html>

⁸International Working Group for Indigenous Affairs <http://www.iwgia.org/sw18358.asp>

⁹In Sarawak there are officially 28 groups listed, but according to the International Working Group for Indigenous Affairs, 37 groups and sub-groups are known, and in Sabah more than 30 groups are recognised. <http://www.iwgia.org/sw18358.asp>

¹⁰For details of the Sarawak Health Department see <http://www.sarawak.health.gov.my> and for the Sabah Health Department see <http://jknsabah.gov.my>

¹¹I am not aware of a more up-to-date study of healthcare in Sabah.

¹²The inclusion of an Orang Asli orientated article (Nicholas and Baer 2007) in Chee and Barraclough's (2007) edited volume on healthcare in Malaysia suggests (in addition to an Orang Asli sympathetic editor) that indigenous healthcare is becoming increasingly visible.