KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA - Heritage Commissioner Prof Datuk Dr Zuraina Majid has skeletons in her closet.
But this does not mean that she harbours dark secrets from her past which she wants to keep under wraps.

Instead, Zuraina is literally keeping eight skeletons in her office.

The skeletons are prized relics -- 6,000-year-old Neolithic human skeletons from Gua Cha, Kelantan, which were brought back to Malaysia after a long stint abroad in January.

Former Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim led a delegation to the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, to procure the relics, which had been kept there for more than 50 years.
They were placed in eight special bags which travelled in style in the passenger cabin of a Malaysia Airlines flight home.

Upon their return, the skeletons of an adult male and female, as well as an infant, were kept in Zuraina's office.

"The skeletons need special conservation as they are very fragile.

"When they arrived, archaeologists from the National Heritage Department had to clean them carefully before conducting a thorough conservation process," she said.

Zuraina said the skeletons needed to be kept at the correct humidity level and temperature to ensure they were fungus-free.

A visit by the New Straits Times to her office recently found that the relics were kept in separate glass cases with 45 to 55 per cent humidity and temperatures from 16 to 22o C.

There was also purple-coloured silica gel in each case to keep humidity low.

Zuraina, who discovered Perak Man in 1990 -- the oldest human skeleton ever found in the country -- said she had to get permission from the United Kingdom, the Department of Civil Aviation Malaysia and the Royal Customs Malaysia, among others, to bring the Gua Cha skeletons back.

"It was a long procedure which I have been pursuing since 2005.

"I visited many agencies to seek legal approval to recover them. This eventually paid off when University of Cambridge vice-chancellor Prof Alison Richard and G. de G. Sieveking's wife gave the nod."

Sieveking was the former Taiping Museum director who made the excavations in 1954 and took the skeletons out of the country.

When he died, his wife, Anne, handed the precious relics to the university for documentation.

It was not known how the skeletons were allowed to be transported out. There were no laws on artifacts then.

Now, Zuraina said the department stresses on enforcement of the National Heritage Act 2005 to prevent heritage items from being taken out of the country.

"We safeguard our heritage through licensing and monitor all excavations conducted in the country."

But her office will not be the final home for the Gua Cha skeletons, as plans are under way to put them on show at the National Museum.

"We are preparing to hold an exhibition there in November so everyone will get a chance to appreciate our heritage."

She said the skeletons were important for local and international researchers to conduct analysis and reference and also to discover the lifestyle and diet of Neolithic men.

The 10,000-year-old limestone cave Gua Cha was believed to be a former settlement of a hunter-gatherer society called the Hoabinhian and was inhabited by the Neolithics 4,000 years later.

Evidence of burnt rice found at the upper level of the cave proved that there was a settlement there.

More than 30 human remains from the Hoabinhian and Neolithic ages were also discovered in the cave.

Zuraina said heritage was not only confined to buildings and monuments.

"Archaeological artifacts, music, natural landscapes, geology, and flora and fauna are also part of the heritage that we should preserve."