NagaWorld Protest Turns Violent, Covid Fears Resurface, Film Festival Shines
Good morning, Cambodia. It's Friday, July 1, and this is your Weekly Dispatch.
SLOW RETURN: Only 50,000 foreigners have visited Siem Reap so far this year, a shocking drop from the millions in pre-pandemic times. More than 1,000 businesses have shut, costing over 20,000 jobs.
LAKE LOST: Tonle Bati is the latest suburban lake to be filled in and sold off by the government. Most of the shoreline of the popular getaway has already been parceled out, leaving many to wonder what else is up for sale.
BRIGHT SPOT: The Cambodia International Film Festival returned in style, with 170 films from 26 countries, including Rithy Panh’s “Everything Will Be Ok” and Neang Kavich’s “White Building.” The marquee event runs through Sunday.
THE LEDE
Street Fight
The deputy governor of Phnom Penh shouted orders and encouragement as more than 100 police officers violently attempted to disperse NagaWorld union protesters at the intersection of Sothearos and Sihanouk boulevards.
Authorities said the protesters were illegally blocking traffic as they tried to march to the mega-casino, so police had the right to remove them by force. Protesters said police went too far, pushing, shoving and assaulting them with hand-held radios.
“They beat me unconscious,” said a demonstrator. “I was shocked because they didn’t bother to consider that we are women. They just dragged us away and beat us like dogs.”
Security troops were caught on video blocking UN observers. Police complained several walkie-talkies were damaged in the melee.
The workers have been protesting since December 2021.
Sokha Saga
Government prosecutors want Kem Sokha back in jail.
In the 46th hearing of his seemingly endless treason trial, prosecuting attorneys played a recording of the former CNRP president meeting with supporters in Siem Reap — an apparent violation of a 2017 court order banning him from politics — and demanded the court throw him back in pretrial detention. The judge let it slide for now, but warned: Do it again and police will come for you.
The UN has denounced the continuing clampdown on opposition figures and asked the Kingdom to review its record of mass arrests and trials. Cambodia dismissed the criticism as one-sided.
Festival Spotlight
A youth football club with a transgender coach. An indigenous community’s culture and cuisine. Rithy Panh’s “Everything Will Be Ok” and Neang Kavich’s “White Building.”
The Cambodia International Film Festival is back and bigger than ever — 170 films from 26 countries, including several from the Kingdom’s roster of up-and-coming big hitters.
“Lotus Sports Club,” directed by Vanna Hem, chronicles Pa Vann Sovann’s barn-storming, queer-friendly football club, which criss-crosses the country in a van challenging local Under-21 girls teams.
“Sanoung,” or food in the Tampoun language, is a 14-minute short produced by a 19-year-old Tampoun film student that addresses stereotypes about her community’s meat-eating habits.
The festival runs through July 3. A full program is available at the CIFF website.
TALKING POINTS
Pay dirt
Cambodia is filling in more lakes. Up next: Tonle Bati, the popular weekend spot 30km south of Phnom Penh. The government plans to reclaim some 220 hectares — roughly two-thirds of the lake — and parcel it out. Maps show nearly the entire shoreline moving into private hands. The deal was made months ago but only recently became public, prompting observers to wonder what else is being sold.
Myanmar Irony
Cambodia, as 2022 ASEAN chair, has awkwardly asked Myanmar to ease up on its adversaries — a soft touch Cambodia’s ruling party has rarely granted its own critics. Cambodia’s foreign minister landed in Naypyidaw for five days of meetings aimed at bringing the country’s warring factions to the table. In a pre-departure statement, the minister said a solution to the country’s conflict must involve a shared political space with all voices allowed.
Tourism Trickle
Siem Reap has counted less than 50,000 foreign visitors so far in 2022, down from the millions who visited before the pandemic. The health crisis forced more than 1,000 tourism-related businesses to close, resulting in a loss of nearly 22,000 jobs. Experts say a full recovery is still years away.
Landslide Win
The CPP crushed it in the commune elections, winning 9,376 of the Kingdom’s 11,622 council seats. Second place went to the Candlelight Party with 2,198. The remaining 48 seats were split among seven smaller parties. The results cement the CPP’s near total domination of power at the local level, putting it in charge of 1,648 communes to the Candlelight Party’s four.
More Officials
The CPP defended a move to increase the number of local political appointees by 40%. The change raises the number of provincial deputy governors from six to 10 and district deputy governors from four to six. Critics said the increase only entrenches the ruling party’s grip on local power and would do little to improve governance.
Covid Returns
The Ministry of Health reported new Covid-19 cases on consecutive days this week, breaking a string of 52 infection-free days. Seven cases were announced on Thursday and 10 on Wednesday. Hun Sen repeated calls for vaccinations and warned of a new outbreak.
BACKPAGES: From The Cambodia Daily Vault
Restorers Face Aesthetic, Practical Dilemmas in Rescuing Ta Prohm
June 29, 2002
The goal of maintaining the wilderness charm of Ta Prohm, the hope of limiting the ongoing invasion of the jungle — which continues to intertwine with, and threaten, the much-loved temple’s walls and statues — and the desire to restore the temple, or just save it from collapse, are all competing for the future of Ta Prohm.
A Closer Look at the Troubled World of Modern Cambodian Cinema
June 29, 2002
In the early 1980s, Cambodians newly liberated from the Khmer Rouge flocked to the cinema. Theaters drew huge crowds, no matter what they showed: old movies and new ones, films about war or politics, stories of love or stories of class struggle. The Cambodian appetite for film is well-known, going back to colonial times and epitomized by the nation’s cinephile King Norodom Sihanouk, who has made more than 20 films. But the golden years are long past.
Funcinpec Memorial Plans Raise Ire of CPP
June 27, 2002
A spokesman for the CPP issued a heated warning Wednesday to Funcinpec officials about their plan to memorialize Funcinpec fighters who died in the July 1997 factional fighting, saying the ceremony may lead to fresh violence.
WEEKEND READING
An Art Crime For thes
Deep in the Cambodian jungle, investigators are unraveling a network that trafficked antiquities on an unprecedented scale and brought them all the way to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
China-born businessman behind one of Cambodia's fastest-growing conglomerates
A curious book collection greets guests in the red-panelled, scarlet-ceilinged lobby lounge of Prince Times hotel, a five-star establishment in Cambodia's Sihanoukville.
Photos: NagaWorld Union protesters, Facebook/Cambodia Daily. Tonle Bati, Wikimedia.
