Reuters/Pring Samrang
A Boeung Kak lake resident is detained by police officers
during a violent clash over disputed land at the Boeung Kak site in
Phnom Penh May 22.
Published on Saturday October 06, 2012
PHNOM PENH, CAMBODIA—In 1979, Phan Chhunreth ventured to Phnom Penh
after toiling for nearly four years in a Khmer Rouge labour camp. Pol
Pot’s genocidal regime had just been toppled by the invading Vietnamese
army and the Cambodian capital, emptied as part of the Khmer Rouge’s
agrarian revolution, stood eerily quiet.
Chhunreth and her family eventually settled near Boeung Kak lake — a
90-hectare pool of stagnant water in the heart of the city. By the early
2000s, more than 4,000 families had moved to the area, which became
popular with tourists for its cheap guest houses, sunset bars and
thriving drug scene.
In 2007, the city of Phnom Penh granted a 99-year, $79-million (US)
lease to develop the lake and its surroundings to Shukaku Inc. — a
previously unknown development firm owned by ruling Cambodian People’s
Party (CPP) senator Lao Meng Khin. With considerable Chinese investment,
it plans to build exclusive shops, apartments and villas at the site.
Boeung Kak’s residents were never consulted.
In 2008, Shukaku began filling the lake with sand. As many of their
homes became inundated with sand and the lake’s polluted water, local
families were given the option of accepting an $8,500 resettlement fee
(less than 25 per cent of their properties’ values) or houses located
more than 20 kilometres from the city.
More than 3,000 families conceded. Forced to then demolish their own
homes, they left in what Amnesty International has called “the largest
forced eviction (in Cambodia) since the Khmer Rouge era.”
Those who remained are still fighting for a fair deal.
“I don’t want to move,” Chhunreth, 54, says from the small boarding
house she runs with her family. Around it, chickens and dogs scavenge
amid the mess of bricks, boards and cinder blocks that used to be her
neighbours’ homes — only their tiled floors remain.
“The government is forcing people to leave,” she says. “There is no justice for us.”
Chhunreth and 12 other women were arrested during a peaceful
demonstration in May. Each was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison for
“abuse on state land” and “obstruction against public officials.”
Boeung Kak
is perhaps the most visible land dispute in what has become a disturbing
trend. Throughout Cambodia, entire communities are being driven from
their homes with little or no compensation in order to make way for
plantations, mines and commercial and residential developments.
Large parcels of land are being leased to both local and foreign
firms as mining licences and economic land concessions. According to
Cambodian human rights monitor LICADHO, such leases now account for 3.9
million hectares, or 21.5 per cent of Cambodia.
An estimated 400,000 to one million Cambodians have been involved in
land disputes in the past decade. In 2011 alone, rights group ADHOC
claims that nearly 60,000 people were forcibly evicted from their homes.
In a June 2012 speech, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said
“Cambodia needs to continue to promote economic growth and accelerate
poverty reduction.” He listed “diversification in the agriculture
sector, agro-industry development” and “private-sector development” as
being essential to this end.
Such
developments, he noted, create jobs. “If everything works according to
the instructions,” he said, “our economic land concessions will do our
country a world of good.
Compounding the clash is that many Cambodians lack formal land titles
— a legacy of the Khmer Rouge’s push to eliminate private property.
While such families are legally entitled to ownership papers if they
have occupied their land continuously since 1996, this policy has not
been widely implemented. (The policy, in any case, does not help to
Chhunreth and her family, who moved to Boeung in 1997.)
Without formal land titles, Cambodian families have no legal recourse
when their homes are being threatened. Even with land titles, there are
no guarantees their property rights will be upheld.
“When someone from a community raises a legal case against a private
company or the authorities, that tends to go nowhere,” says Nora
Lindstrom Sahmakum Teang Tnaut, a housing-rights non-governmental
organization (NGO). “When the authorities or a company raise a complaint
against a community member, it tends to get processed quite quickly.”
Evictions are often brutal and protests have been violently
suppressed. In May, a 14-year-old girl was shot to death by government
security forces as they cleared a village in the northeast.
Having encouraged the village to resist the development of a rubber
plantation, local radio journalist Mam Sonando and eight members of the
community were arrested. Authorities accused them of masterminding a
“secessionist plot.”
On Monday, Sonando was sentenced to 20 years in prison. His
co-defendants received suspended sentences ranging from 10 months to
five years. Three other community leaders received 15 to 30 year
sentences in absentia. Those responsible for killing the unarmed girl
have not faced legal action.
In southern Cambodia,
a coalition of NGOs claim that more than 12,000 people have lost their
homes, farmland, community forests or grazing land through the
development of industrial sugarcane plantations, 10 of which have been
linked to CPP senator-tycoon Ly Yong Phat.
With both state and private security forces having been accused of
burning crops and shooting livestock, the Clean Sugar Campaign is
calling on the European Union to boycott Cambodian “blood sugar” — an
export that benefits from a duty- and quota-free EU trade initiative
aimed at “fostering development” in the world’s poorest countries.
At Boeung Kak, protests have been quashed by police with riot
shields, motorbike helmets and electric batons. Live ammunition and
bulldozers have been used at other disputed sites in the city. Elsewhere
in the country, the story is much the same.
As protests become more common, Cambodian authorities are
increasingly resorting to violence, says Amnesty International
researcher Rupert Abbott.
“The government and the authorities can be incredibly paranoid,” says
Abbott, who believes they are seeing resistance over land issues “as a
challenge to their authority and the supremacy of the Cambodian People’s
Party.”
Cambodian authorities have staunchly defended their actions. “We
cannot let the people fight on the streets,” Cambodia Council of
Ministers spokesman Phay Siphan has said. “We keep law and order.”
According to CPP National Assembly member Cheam Yeap, “the impact (of
land concessions) is just so little compared to the benefits for the
country’s economy. . . . The affected people should understand that they
should sacrifice for the nation in order to help government in reducing
people’s poverty.”
In August 2011, the World Bank announced it was suspending all future
loans to Cambodia until the Boeung Kak issue is resolved. Shortly
thereafter, the prime minister declared that a small parcel of land
would be put aside at the site for the lake’s remaining residents.
While 779 families were granted titles in this area, 96 — including
Phan Chhunreth’s — were initially excluded. At least 20 plots were
allegedly awarded to Lao Meng Khin, the senator, and his wife.
Twenty-six excluded families later accepted undisclosed cash
settlements. The area promised by the prime minister has yet to be
officially demarcated. The World Bank lending freeze is still in place.
Emboldened by local media attention and the support of several NGOs,
Boeung Kak’s remaining residents have vowed to protest until every
excluded family receives a settlement. Since May, however, at least 17
local land activists have been arrested.
International pressure, nevertheless, seems to be having some effect.
In June, 13 Boeung Kak women, including Phan Chhunreth, had their
sentences commuted after spending more than a month in prison. Their
vocal supporters included U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and
their appeal trial was attended by representatives from several Western
embassies.
Tol Srey Pov,
35, is a village leader and part of the so-called “Boeung Kak 13” released in June. She has been arrested twice before.
The ground around her community office is strewn with rubble. Nearby,
children play on the vast expanse of sand that used to be Boeung Kak
lake. A fishing boat lies half-buried at its edge. The imposing grey
façade of Cambodia’s Council of Ministers is just visible to the south.
“The government doesn’t care about the people,” Srey Pov says. “The
rich get richer; the poor only get poorer. . . . There are many
injustices in Cambodia.”
According to Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre for Human
Rights, the majority of forced evictions in Phnom Penh are simply a
matter of land speculation.
“These companies are basically government officials with power trying
to grab these lands so they can actually sell it later on,” Virak says.
“Thousands and thousands of families are being affected and nothing
happens . . . not a single building goes up.”
Eight kilometres south of Boeung Kak, the 26-square-kilometre Boeung
Tumpun lake is currently being filled with sand. “In one or two years,”
Virak says, “it’s going to be the same thing as Boeung Kak.”
LAND DISPUTES IN NUMBERS
12
Cambodian land activists currently incarcerated in Phnom Penh
13
Land concessions granted since a temporary moratorium was announced on May 7
33
Years the CPP has dominated Cambodian politics. Hun Sen has been prime minister since 1985
55
Communities in Phnom Penh currently awaiting eviction
70
Families at Boeung Kak Lake still awaiting land titles
401
Vacant plots within Boeung Kak Lake’s 12.44-hectare settlement area
424
Land concessions and mining licenses granted by the government since 1996
2,000
Student volunteers dispatched across Cambodia this year to measure
properties and issue land titles. They are only measuring properties in
undisputed areas
4 comments:
this resident is hard head persons...
never complied with the authority
come on, we need to improved our city,.
to clean up dirty places, clean up drug dealer, sanitation, thief, etc..
We all want Ah Hun Sen to clean up and improve the city. But we want AH Hun Sen to clean up his CPP dogs who are making the city dirty with crimes, drugs and murders.
Where can the poor villagers get the weapons and drugs from? What about Ah Hun Sen dogs killing Khmer?
don't get mad , take it easy, dear
we khmer are not mad at you dumb cpp dog.
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