Hun Sen – 15 Years Later…
Fifteen years ago today, the Cambodia Daily published my
letter-to-editor, below, discussing many interesting points Hun Sen had made in
his in-depth interview with the newspaper.
Hun Sen then promised reforms, within 10 years, of armed
forces, public administration and finance, and judicial system. If by reform he
means making all State institutions pander to his every whim, then he is
successful. Otherwise, he fails. He has proved he is incapable of building institutions
that would serve the nation, not him and his personal interest groups.
Anyhow, he has delivered a lower-middle-income status as
promised when Cambodia’s gross national income (GNI) per capital hits $1,070 in
2015. Phnom Penh is flooded with SUVs, high-rise buildings, and
infrastructures.
However, given a laissez-faire approach Hun Sen has adopted,
the achievement that is inevitable comes with great costs to environment and
people’s livelihood: deforestation, sand dredging, river ecosystem and fishery disruptions,
insidious evictions, labour exploitations, food poisoning, traffic deaths and congestions,
and increasing income inequalities between the well-connected and others.
It is the progress that only 3% of the population World Bank
considers prospers, leaving a majority destitute. About 11.2 million people
(72%) survive on a maximum daily income of $2.60; among them, 3.1 million
struggle with less than $1.26. They would need a Thy Sovantha wonder to get off
the Hun Sen poverty trap.
Cambodian people, especially intellectuals who form a pillar
of any nation, are fundamentally broken. They coddle Hun Sen’s peace and
stability that shoot civilians on the streets, execute, and jail his credible critics
at will. Those intellectuals who have benefited from Hun Sen’s corrupt
autocracy are at the forefront justifying anything Hun Sen dishes out. Like Hun
Sen, they are prepared to pay anything for their peace and personal interests.
Now, Hun Sen says he will hang on for another four decades.
Will he? “Yes” is the answer – he will remain premier, even with life support.
His followers will keep him in office, or in coma, until they carry him out in
a box.
Anyhow, will he achieve by 2030 his aim of an upper-middle-income
status that currently requires a GNI per capita of $4,036, and a high-income
status (with $12,745 GNI) by 2050?
Unlikely, unless he becomes more ruthless than he has ever
been. Between 2010 and 2015 Cambodia’s GNI per capita grows at 9.8% per year.
Assuming an annual inflation of 2.50% and population growth of 1.57%, the GNI will
need an average yearly increase of 14.6% until 2030. It will be much higher if
the status threshold of $4,036 is inflation-adjusted. This means whatever Hun
Sen has done to achieve the lower-middle-income status must be escalated for
the next target. He must cut down more trees; dredging more sand; begging China
for more funds to build infrastructures; exploiting more cheap labour; letting many
more of the 72% die from inadequate healthcare and traffic accidents, etc.
Hence, the light at the end of the tunnel Cambodian people
have been waiting for is increasingly an oncoming train.
Ung Bun Ang
09i17
Concerning the Hun Sen interview (Cambodia Daily, Jan 1-4):
Former French president Charles de Gaulle supposedly once said, “Since a
politician never believes what he says, he is surprised when others believe
him.”
The interview was impressive from a public relations
perspective. The prime minister knows the public relations game well. He should
earn significant political points for ingratiating himself with King Norodom
Sihanouk. With his long record of abusing the King in the past, his sincerity
is open to question. But maybe he has changed.
The Cambodia Daily seemed so impressed with his ideas about
liberal democracy that it asked him when he developed such thoughts. A cynic
would argue that commune elections could have been held much sooner and without
enormous pressure from donor countries to do so.
Given the countless human rights violations inflicted upon
his opposition, it is difficult to believe the prime minister was really
committed to liberal democracy all those years. If it is a newly acquired idea,
then the absence of any violence before the elections would support his claims.
According to the prime minister, in the next 10 years, “We
need to reform the armed forces, administration, judicial and court system, as
well as public finance.”
A skeptic would question whether reform is possible under
the current regime, which for 23 years has been based primarily on the culture
of violence and corruption. The current crooked characters of those
institutions never have been seriously challenged. Any genuine reform would
certainly erode the power base of the current regime.
If only the prime minister had a decent track record of
matching his words with deeds, then his words in the interview would be music
to all ears.
Unfortunately, his record shows he very often talks of
principles, but acts in his personal interest. An optimist would say maybe he
has changed.
Hun Sen says another Khmer Rouge-type massacre could not
occur because “We have the constitution to prevent it.” The jury is still out
on whether the current constitution could prevent such catastrophe. It has been
ignored, manipulated, and changed to suit the political expediency. I doubt it
is worth the paper it is printed on.
The prime minister claims he supported the 1993 elections,
and says he was put under house arrest because elements in the CPP wanted to
replace him. Yet those same elements accepted him as second prime minister when
that position was created to appease those who were prepared to take up arms
again. For the prime minister’s claim to be logical, those CPP elements would
have favoured someone else for second prime minister.
It is a clever public relations exercise to say the Throne
Council will choose the next king. But impartial observers would say the
council, like other state instruments, has been stacked with members under the
influence of the prime minister. His assumed modesty on this topic is touching.
When the prime minister vows to spend the second half of his
life fighting poverty, it seems his immediate priority is to jointly build a
golf course with Thailand and Laos. The poor in that region may take some
comfort that their leaders will get rid of land mines first. He says he aims to
raise the per capita income to $1,000. He may just do it. As he knows from his
23 years’ experience running the country, per capita income can be increased by
substantially raising incomes for the rich and powerful.
Overall, a close scrutiny of the prime minister’s interview
reveals that, just as it has been for the past 700 years, Cambodians will have
to wait for the light at the end of the tunnel, and hope it is not an oncoming
train.
Ung Bun Ang
Melbourne, Australia.
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