Royalist parties warned of losing parliamentary seats if they merged

Funcinpec's 2008 election rally in Phnom Penh.

By Khmerization

Source: CEN

Members of parliament from the royalist Funcinpec Party and Nationalist Party, formerly the Norodom Ranariddh Party, have been warned that they will lose their parliamentary seats if the two parties merged. The warning came after Mr. Sao Rany, MP from the Nationalist Party, wrote a letter to the Constitutional Council asking it to interpret the validity and the consitutionality of a merger between the two royalist parties.

The Constitutional Council said the MPs from the two parties will lose their parliamentary seats if they merged. The Constitutional Council's interpretaion drew rave criticism from political analysts who said that the interpretation seemed to be aimed at scaring the opposition parties from merging to seriously compete against the ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP) in future elections.

The Constitutional Council's interpretation and ruling has also been seen to be a big hurdle to the planned merger between the royalist Funcinpec Party and the Nationalist Party as well as the planned merger of the opposition Sam Rainsy Party and the Human Rights Party which have also planned to merge sometime before the 2012 commune and 2013 national elections.