Penampang is a fertile plain washed by the Putatan River. It was a region opened by the descendants of the third son and child of Maragang, Tomui.(1) Sometimes, Maragang is stated as 'Kimaragang' where the 'ki' stands for 'aki' referring to a male ancestor.
Some of the earliest writings on North Borneo often refers to a part of this area as Putatan. Putatan hugs the coast. It was populated by the Kadazan people whom the British colonialists named 'Dusun' because that was what the Bruneis told them when they first came. Now the place is densely populated by several races most of whom are Muslims.
The Putatan River meanders upstream right up to the mountainous hinterland flowing as the Moyog River. It is at the upper part of the river that the Babagon Dam was constructed to provide water to most of the inhabitants of the west coast of Sabah, formerly North Borneo.
The region was named North Borneo because it is at the northenmost region of the island of Borneo, the third largest island in the world. The Moyog River is called the Putatan only when it nears Putatan.
The Penampang District borders Tambunan District to the east, Papar District to the South and the city of Kota Kinabalu to the west. The district covers the state constituencies of Moyog and Kepayan. These two constituencies make up the Parliamentary seat of Penampang. The newly-established District of Putatan had been carved out of Penampang District more than a year ago.
The main town of Penampang is Donggongon with Kepayan Ridge as a smaller one. There was a row of two blocks of shops at Kasigui. The shop owners were made to shift to Donggongon after the shops were razed to the ground several years ago. There is nothing to indicate there were shops at Kasigui. What remain are the food stalls. The oldest of this is still run by the grandchildren of a China man the people of Penampang called "Sapi" because he used beef for his noodle soup.
Decades ago, large tracts of land at Penampang were planted with wet rice. Now, only the Kodundungan area is planted with rice. Maybe, it is a matter of time before these are gone, too. You can still find buffaloes at Penampang but these have somehow become wild and had not been broken to pull ploughs and logs and to carry heavy things on their backs. Buffaloes are not needed since these things are done mechanically now. This is what is happening at Kodundungan. It is said that only about three hundred acres of rice fields remain.
Where rice fields were found in the past, you can only find concrete buildings now. The highway from Jesselton (now Kota Kinabalu) passes through Penampang to Papar. More lands will be lost to development. Penampang is in danger of losing its characteristics. The loss of lands to business people may accelerate with the coming completion of the Pan-Borneo Highway.
It is hoped that with the increased traffic due to the Pan-Borneo Highway that joins Sabah with Sarawak, business opportunities will increase for the Kadazan people. What is definite for now is that rich Chinese will offer to buy Kadazan lands along the highway at a price Kadazan landowners may not be able to reject.
Whither Kadazans?
Read more about Penampang HERE
(1) According to P.S. Shim, Tomui was the ancestor of a number of Kadazandusun tribes. He did not mention whether or not Tomui migrated to the west of Sabah.
Updated on November 8, 2017
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