Hun Sen condones violence and also pretends to condemn it

[Image credit VOD]

 By Khmer Wathanakam
Read more news at  www.cambo-asean.blogspot.com

A pattern of violent tactic against political dissidents by Hun Sen's regime has been repeated in Cambodia since the 1993 election sponsored by the UN.  This wily, tricky regime has very high skill in dealing with its political opponents by using all available means to humiliate, to weaken, and to destroy them at the end.  Usually, Hun Sen plays two actors in the same episode: to be an Asura and Devada at the same scene.  Since 1993 election, hundreds of opposition members, union leaders, workers, journalists, environment activists, and even movie and singer stars have been murdered in cold blood and viciously, but none of perpetrators has ever been brought to justice.  Such a culture of impunity has flourished in Cambodian society for decades.  No one can change or stop it if Hun Sen has magic power to plays two roles as an Asura and Devada at the same time.  Sometimes, a victim of violence or discrimination has become a double victims or an innocent person has been framed as a scapegoat to cover up a real murderer. Cambodia has become a hybrid society; it is a constitutional monarchy democracy on the banner, but in reality it is a authoritarian and mafia state. During Pol Pot's regime, they taught people to be obedient and deaf in order to survive, but in the current regime they teach people to see black as white and good people as bad and vie versa.  It is very unusual and unreasonable that the prime minister organizes a violent protest against the opposition, a powerless group who has no role to make any key decision relating to the country's affair while the prime minister has all power to decide a fate of the nation.  Ridiculously, those protesters demanded Kem Sokha to resign from his post as vice president of the National Assembly, a powerless position, why not asked Hun Sen and Heng Samrin to resign, who have held power over three decades and committed countless mistakes and atrocities? In democratic countries in the world, the people protest and criticize their leaders or the ruling party, for they run the country so they eventually makes some mistakes.  And the people demand them to resign when they commit severe mistake or fail to fulfill their promises, not to ask the opposition leaders to resign; they can't hold accountable for the people since they don't rule the country. Such a violent mob against the opposition party rarely happens in democratic countries, only in authoritarian states.  But this violent mob here can be easily to prevent it if Hun Sen did not give a green light and the authority has been given order to stop it.

[Violent mobs screamed in front National Assembly, no police presence, image Khmer Times]

Absurdly, Hun Sen, after returned from Paris, has repeatedly called this vicious attack on the two CNRP's MPs unusual or weird, but usually such a violent mob has been set up systematically against the opposition for decades in pattern by his regime.  Hun Sen should not be surprised for such a barbaric act as he condoned and encouraged by his incendiary speeches from Paris.  Where were the security forces and police who used to deploy against protesters in the past? In Facebook we saw some security personnel who used to crackdown the peaceful protests in the past became a protester at this time.  And some of those protesters are Hun Sen's bodyguards as one driver who transported them to protest in front of the National Assembly told RFA that he would not do it if he knew they came to protest.  Also there are numerous accounts from CNRP's MPs and journalists and NGO' observers claimed that the atmosphere surround the National Assembly as well as inside the building was very unusual when they saw an absence of security guards inside and outside the building, instead they saw many unidentified people walking in and out of the National Assembly building freely.  Furthermore, when the mob came to besiege Khem Sokha's residence, throwing rocks at his home that trapped his wife more than six hours inside, Kem Sokha desperately tried many times to call Sar Kheng to help protect his family and himself but no answer.  At the same time, CNRP's MPs in the Assembly Building tried to call Phnom Penh City Hall for intervention but no answer as well.  This is a systematic set up that well coordinated and executed by high-ranking government officials seamlessly. Imagine how Hun Sen and his security forces would react if the protesters from the opposition parties, garment workers or from land grab victims beat up the CPP's PMs like that.  Those protesters would be shot to dead or arrested immediately such as the event in Veng Sreng Road in early 2014.

This is Hun Sen's old political tactics; he always tries to push a situation into a brinkmanship before pull back or cool it down.  In 2003, Hun Sen orchestrated and ordered the violent mob to burn down Thai Embassy and businesses without clear information and good reason.  Then he acted as a savior or Devada again, ordering to arrested and imprison those protesters and compensate damages over $50 million to Thailand, wasting the national budget.  Furthermore, Hun Sen ordered his bodyguard unit to protect a returned Thai Ambassador who had fled the mob by boat behind the embassy.  Now a pattern of incident repeated, when he returned from France, he tried to change his image from Asura to Devada, condemning the barbaric violence against the two parliamentarians and ordering an arrest the perpetrators to justice, along with offering compensation to treat the injury of the two victims and repair their damaged cars.  This kind of violent tactic against his opponents can benefit Hun Sen two ways: as an Asura actor, he can terrify and scare their enemies from threatening his power grip, and as a Devada, he can show his sympathy to the victims caused by his actions, and promise to find perpetrators to justice in order to deceive public opinion that he is a responsible and cared leader as the Devada. In fact, he is a true Asura wearing Devada clothes or a tiger wearing sheep skin.

Now Hun Sen and Sar Kheng have created a special commission to investigate this violent attack, and Cambodian people as well as the international community are watching whether the government can catch the real perpetrators to justice as promised.  Based on past experiences, there were numerous murder cases implicating with government sponsored attacks and killings on political dissidents have never found any perpetrator to justice for any single case such as a grenade attack on peaceful rally in 1997, causing 16 dead and hundred more injured, the killing hundreds of Forncinpec officials and supporters in a aftermath of the 1997 bloody coup, the series murder cases on union leader Chea Vichea, movie and singer stars, Piseth Chealika, Touch Srey Nich, Khat Marina, Environmental activist, Chut Vuthy, seven protesters death during post-election protest, and many journalists and so forth.  Now another fearing is that the government may frame some innocent people to use as scapegoat in order to cover up the real perpetrators. For example, the Chea Vichea's murder case, the authority framed and arrested the two innocent people as the killers of CheaVichea when the real perpetrators are still at large. As the Human Rights Watch director Mr. Brad Adam has confirmed that the CPP's leadership usually sent its so called "reaction forces" to terrorized, attack, and kill the opposition, and it pretends to investigate those violence cases only in order to cover up its own involvement.  This is the real culprit that Hun Sen's regime has carried out over three decades and continues without ending on sight as this new incident has proved it, and many analysts including CNRP' leader Sam Rainsy have cautioned that more similar waves of such a violent attack will be unleashed by the current regime as election date draws closer.