Increase spending on education, not army

Written by OU Sopheary

Tuesday, 25 November 2008 Phnom Penh Post

Dear Editor, I strongly disagree with the government's proposals that place an emphasis on defence in next year's national budget. If we do weight defence, my first question is with whom might we fight? If we think war between Cambodia and Thailand could occur due to the Preah Vihear case, why not bring the case to the International Court of Justice now? The solution to this problem is very simple. We should not make it worse by destroying our own people and resources. To me, a proposal for increasing the budget on defence does not make any sense. Taking a very different view from the proposal, I think health, education and agriculture should be heavily emphasised. Poverty reduction is the prime goal for Cambodia as a least developed country. Spending more money on defence doesn't have any contribution to reduce poverty in this country. Cambodia's Millennium Development Goals indicate that our national budget should be heavily emphasised on the three sectors mentioned above. Unfortunately, only a relatively small percentage of the national budget is planned to be allocated to these. I beg the government and the parliament to reconsider this proposal for the sake of all Cambodian people. OU Sopheary Phnom Penh