SERIAN: The Bidayuh here are urged to emulate their brethren in Bau in conserving their ancestral hills and mountains while allowing visitors to visit these places.
In making this call, Infrastructure Development and Communication Minister Dato Sri Michael Manyin Jawong said Mount Sadong — the ancestral home of the Bukar Bidayuh community here — would be promoted as a tourism spot.
“In Bau District, they have Bung Jagoi, Dorod Singai and Bung Bratak which are well known and receiving visitors almost every week. But in Serian, we are yet to have a similar one like theirs,” he said in announcing a grant to start the conservation and promotion of Mount Sadong at the Gawai Nyara Mari Sawa (Gawai countdown dinner) at Balu Gambang, Kampung Taee on Sunday night.
The 1,800-metre Mount Sadong is a cultural heritage and pride to the Bukar people, a sub-dialect Bidayuh group in the Serian Division.
It also serves as water catchment area particularly for the villages of Tarat, Kakeng, Jenan, Bantang, Lanchang, Taee, Baru and Bunga.
So sacred is the mountain to the Bukar Bidayuhs that 1,000 people staged a protest in 2013 following encroachment by a company.
A local band immortalised the mountain by recording a song called Darud Sadong.
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