Outcry Over Oknha Murder, Airport Arrival Cards Erased, Film Festival Opens
Good morning, Cambodia. It's Friday, June 21, and this is your Weekly Dispatch.
LATE ARRIVAL: Those arrival cards you fill out and march through the visa process at Pochentong will be gone by July 1! The cards will be replaced by an online form that requires uploaded pictures. Expect turbulence.
STRONG TALK: The murder of a young couple at the hands of a gun-wielding, wealthy suspect has Cambodia asking the right questions: How to solve a dispute without violence and how to control gun ownership.
REBOOT CITY: Hun Manet wants to remake Phnom Penh as a smart, clean city on par with any in ASEAN. Traffic and security issues will fade away, he says, with more public transportation and better technology.
THE LEDE
Open Mic
Imagine if your 71-year-old grandfather ranted on social media, using phrases from a bygone era. Now, imagine if your grandfather is Hun Sen, has 14 million followers, and is the de facto leader of Cambodia.
Welcome to this week's cringe-worthy internet episode from the Strongman, who purportedly went on Facebook and Khmer social media to call on the CPP to “smash” opposition activists in order to recruit them. (Sounding like vintage 1970s agitprop.)
Was it real? Was it leaked? Was it a “psychological threat,” as an opposition leader put it?
Either way, it was effective. Within days, an ex-CNRP leader in California rushed to join the CPP, citing Hun Sen’s leadership. Who’s next?
Protest Signs
It’s more bad news for the Kingdom’s labor groups.
The union boss at Wing Star Shoes, which makes shoes for ASICS, will spend six months in prison for conspiracy to commit theft. Owners at nearby Shengbo Garment refused to rehire the factory’s union president despite a year-old Labor Department order to do so. And the Kingdom’s top labor alliance, CENTRAL, has been hit with protests following a report that shows union leaders regularly face intimidation, threats, harassment and blacklisting.
Protesters representing about 70 labor groups demanded CENTRAL revise the report, saying they would ask the Ministry of Interior to ban the alliance if it refused.
True Justice
A real estate tycoon was arrested for the brutal murder of a young, soon-to-wed couple in what police called a dispute over clothes lines and a mango tree.
The now-defrocked oknha is accused of storming into the fiancés home and blasting them with 12 shots from an illegal handgun — in a viral crime that unleashed an unusual degree of state and public concern.
The Ministry of Cults and Religion issued guidelines on anger management, the Minister of Civil Service called for the inherent peace of a Buddhist society, and the Ministry of Interior echoed many observers by calling for tighter gun controls.
The outcry, for a change, was forward looking. Hopefully, policies will follow.
TALKING POINTS
Level Up
Singapore is bullish on Cambodia. The countries signed agreements aimed at deepening economic and political ties as they celebrate 60 years of diplomatic relations next year. The initiatives include expanding digital governance, improving trade links and combating financial crimes.
Urban Renewal
Hun Manet vowed to turn Phnom Penh into a modern smart city. The proposal calls for wider green spaces, improved public transportation and the increased use of technology to battle the city’s growing traffic and security problems.
Black Air
Levi’s, Lululemon, Walmart and Disney. Those are just some of the 35 international brands with waste burning in the Kingdom’s brick kilns, despite years of promises to put an end to the toxic fires. Responsibility starts with government regulators, critics say, and no one is holding them to account.
Big Squeeze
Taxes are up, business is down, and market vendors across the capital are pleading for a break. Sellers welcomed a move to clamp down on price gouging and unofficial fees charged by corrupt officials, but they say it’s not enough. Apparently, government reports of a rosy economy are not true for everyone.
Pixel Push
The stack of arrival cards that greet air travelers will vanish beginning July 1 — to be replaced with digital versions available online or via mobile app. The new nine-page form includes arrival, customs and health declarations, and requires the user to upload a portrait and passport photo. Teething pains are expected.
Unsafe Bet
Cambodia’s high-rises are plagued with foreigners falling from the upper floors. In the last week, a Taiwanese man leapt to his death from the 5th-floor of a Bavet casino and a Chinese national broke his leg after jumping from the window of a Sihanoukville gambling resort, allegedly to escape human traffickers. The incidents follow two similar deaths in Phnom Penh last month.
Star Gaze
The Cambodia International Film Festival kicks off Tuesday with a record 140 movies from 41 countries. The five-day program opens with “Elvis of Cambodia,” a documentary about Sinn Sisamouth. Other notables include "The Harvest," by Cambodian-American director Caylee So, "Sugarcane Baby," from Phnom Penh’s LD Pictures, "Silent Murders," starring Ros Mony and Emily Markiss, and “Wing B,” a 13-minute short from John Pirozzi. All screenings are free and open to the public.
BACKPAGES: From The Cambodia Daily Vault
Rights Group Reports Rise in Political Slayings
June 18, 2004
There have been 40 suspected politically motivated killings in Cambodia in the first five months of this year, local human rights group Adhoc said Thursday, adding that the number is its largest caseload in four years.
Poor Farmers Fighting to Keep Their Land
June 17, 2004
It was 1979 when Um Thon was assigned a plot of marshy land in what is now Russei Keo district, along with five of his comrades in a communist-organized rice planting brigade known as a “Solidarity Team.”
Untac Accused of Theft, Drugs, Womanizing
June 17, 2004
An expose detailing corruption, sex scandals and drunken benders of various UN peacekeeping missions, including Untac, has hit markets this month, ruffling feathers at the highest ranks of the world body.
WEEKEND READING
‘They suggested I sell my daughter’: The dark side of global microfinance
An idea that would eradicate the world’s poverty has led to debt traps and empty stomachs.
Photos: Hun Sen, Facebook. “Wing B,” courtesy CIFF.
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