Tep Vanny (left) and her movement have vowed to keep protesting until all the evicted families have replacement homes
Phnom
Penh, a city once fabled for its stately colonial buildings and
boulevards, and its serene riverside setting, is becoming a city of
glaring contrasts.
An economy left in ruins by the years of war and violent
revolution in the 1970s and 80s grew at a rate of almost 10% a year from
1998 to 2008. Cheap land, cheap labour and rich natural resources have
attracted big inflows of foreign investment, especially from Asian
neighbours like China, Vietnam and Thailand. That has ignited a property
boom.
For the first time in its history Phnom Penh's skyline is
being pierced by modern high-rise towers, offering new office space and
luxury apartments. Land prices are soaring, and developers are
constantly seeking out new possibilities for construction.
One area they targeted was the city's largest lake, Boeng
Kak. A company owned by a senator from the ruling Cambodian People's
Party, Shukaku, was given a 99-year lease to drain and build on the lake
in 2007.
Another was the centre city neighbourhood of Borei Keila,
which another politically-connected company, Phanimex, was given the
right to develop in 2003.
But there was a problem. People already lived on this land.
Like most of Phnom Penh's residents, they had moved to the city after
the fall of the radical Khmer Rouge regime, which had emptied Phnom Penh
in 1975, and following the decade of civil war in the 1980s.
Some residents evicted from Borei Keila have been forced to live in tents
They did not have land titles; very few people do in Cambodia,
as the Khmer Rouge abolished private property and nearly all documents
were destroyed.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
Tep Vanny CampaignerI've been detained by the police five times”
So the state claims to own more
than 80% of Cambodia's land. That gives the government the final say
over who gets to develop it.
The bulldozers moved in to start demolishing the flimsy
houses around Boeng Kak lake in 2008. There have been clashes with local
residents ever since. Some have been beaten by riot police as they
tried to block the developers, other have been arrested and charged.
Many of them are women.
One of them, 31 year-old Tep Vanny, has become the leader of
the women who are still protesting against their treatment by the
company. A passionate and outspoken mother of two, she and her husband
were previously evicted from land they lived on in Kampong Speu province
near Phnom Penh, and moved to Boeng Kak in 2004.
Last year she was charged with rebellion and illegally
occupying land, and sentenced to two and a half years in prison. She was
released on appeal after two months.
"I've been detained by the police five times," she told me in
the house next to the drained lake that the women use as a campaign
headquarters.
"The last time I was sentenced to jail. This is normal in my
country. Before I started this work I thought hard about what I would
face, but I knew I could not back down. I had to fight the corrupt
officials and the greedy companies which are harming the lives of our
people."
Foreign investment has ignited a property development boom in Cambodia
More than 4,000 families were evicted from the area around the
lake, which has since been filled with sand. There was no prior
consultation, and the World Bank responded by suspending all loans to
Cambodia in August 2011.
The government then ordered the company to allocate a small
portion of land to some of the evicted families, but there are still
more than 60 families who have been excluded.
'Powerful interests'
Tep Vanny and her movement have vowed to keep protesting until
all the families have replacement homes. They are also supporting other
poor Cambodians who have lost homes to the country's breakneck
development. There are plenty of them.
Tim Sakmony is a 64 year-old grandmother and, like Tep Vanny, she has also spent time in jail.
She lives in Borei Keila, and has led the families protesting
against their exclusion from the deal under which Phanimex would be
allowed to redevelop the site in return for building 10 apartment blocks
for the displaced residents. The company only built eight.
Over 4,000 families have been evicted from the area around Boeng Kak lake
Tim Sakmony was given a six-month sentence for "making a false
declaration", a complaint filed by the owner of Phanimex. She was
released after three months, but still cries when she talks about her
treatment.
"I went to see the owner of Phanimex, to claim a home for my
son, who is disabled and cannot speak for himself. After that I was
summoned to court."
"I thought it was an opportunity to explain about my case. But the judge sentenced me to six months."
She and her son, a former soldier who bought a small plot of
land at Borei Keila, are now living with his 12 year-old twins in the
stairwell of one of the completed apartment blocks. The area lies next
to a festering rubbish dump.
A few hundred metres away, upmarket apartments are under construction.
Last year the government responded to international pressure
over widespread land grabs by politically-connected companies by
authorising a project to give land titles to 470,000 people.
Tim Sakmony spent three months in jail for "making a false declaration"
But the student volunteers carrying out the project are only
allowed to work on uncontested land. That excludes the many thousands of
Cambodians who are fighting eviction.
Human rights groups estimate that 700,000 people have been
adversely affected by land development, and they say the government and
the courts openly side with the developers.
Speaking about the case of Yorm Bopha, another activist who
was jailed for three years for protesting against the evictions from
Boeng Kak, Brad Adams of Human Rights Watch said this week that "a
politically controlled judiciary has targeted a brave woman who has the
audacity to challenge powerful interests and people".
No comments:
Post a Comment