Island community wins land rights
A Muslim community whose village on Koh Muk was destroyed by the tsunami in 2004 has secured land rights for resettlement - news hailed as a victory for communities fighting for formal land rights along the Andaman coast.
"The Koh Muk case is a source of inspiration for how this issue can be resolved in the interest of local communities," the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said yesterday.Many fishing communities on the Andaman coast that lived for decades without formal land rights suddenly faced eviction notices after the tsunami, as commercial developers laid claim to land where their villages had been. As communities tried to rebuild their villages conflicts also arose with local and provincial authorities over zoning laws for national parks. Of 412 villages affected by the tsunami, 59 face problems linked to insecure land tenure, the UNDP said. Fishing communities, including many Muslim and sea gypsy villages, have been especially affected. "Land disputes and land grabbing have become one the biggest obstacles to the longer-term economic recovery of tsunami-ravaged communities in Thailand," said Hakan Bjorkman, UNDP deputy resident representative for Thailand. The national tsunami land sub-committee, other government agencies and community members jointly developed the plan to solve the Koh Muk dispute. The agreed solution offered to facilitate a process of issuing a land title to the community as a group, rather than to individuals or families - to prevent individuals from selling the land to investors. The NationKoh Muk, Trang
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