CAMBODIA: Authorities destroy people’s livelihood and freedom of enterprise 

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has learned that on the morning of 27 June 2006 the Municipality of Sihanoukville, Cambodia’s seaport town and seaside resort, sent a mixed police force of 100 men armed with rifles and electric batons, 80 workers, three bulldozers and 10 trucks to evict 32 families from the beach of O Cheuteal in Commune no. 4 of the same town. Those police officers and workers tore down altogether 70 wooden food stalls and homes belonging to those families and transported away their belongings. The victims resisted in vain the demolition of their stalls and homes. In the afternoon a warehouse caught fire. The police succeeded in completing the demolition of the stalls and huts within that section of the beach. They were ordered to demolish similar stalls and huts at the next section of the beach only to be met by stiff resistance from groups of youths who barricaded themselves in. They burned car tyres and threw rocks, petrol bombs and acid bottles at the police forcing them to retreat and withdraw from the area.  Nevertheless, the municipality is determined to resume the eviction on July 2.

Say Hak, the governor of Sihanoukville, claimed that what he was doing was “for development and poverty reduction” and charged that those families were living in the area “illegally”. He further said that all the beaches would be organised for local and foreign tourists, and added that “we can’t keep them in the dirt like this.” But he had no plan to relocate the victims and was non-committal as to whether the evictees would receive any compensation. He simply said they would be given another place to continue their businesses.

The area was thus cleared so that it can be leased out to Sokimex, a giant petroleum company and supporter of the ruling party, to invest between USD 70 and 80 million in the construction of a 500-room hotel with a 1000-person conference room, a nine-hole golf course, diving facilities and a parking lot.

The AHRC has learned that the evicted victims are fishermen. They have been living and running the food stalls for tourists on that beach for many years; some of them since 1997. All of them live in difficult conditions. They had lodged their protests against their eviction with different authorities, including the Ministry of Parliamentary Relations and Inspection. The head of the latter government department had even urged the municipal authorities to work out a peaceful settlement with those families and avoid any confrontation with them.

The AHRC condemns the defiance of these ministerial instructions, the excessive use of force used during the eviction and the lack of a relocation plan and proper compensation for the victims. This is a violation of their rights to housing, to work and to freedom of enterprise. This eviction is a violation of the rule of law when it had been arbitrarily decided by the government without any due process of law and any court judgment to that effect.  The AHRC also condemns the Cambodian government’s policy of favouring the rich and powerful at the expense of the poor and the weak. This eviction is not “for development and poverty reduction” as Say Hak claimed. It is for the impoverishment of the poor. It is also discriminatory against the victims given that they are as entitled to occupy state land as the rich and powerful to make a living. A more caring, pro-poor government would help, or get international development agencies or Sokimex itself to help, to modernise and integrate their small tourist catering businesses into the big tourist complex yet to be built. The beaches of Sihanoukville would then be clean as Say Hak had wished.

SUGGESTED ACTION:

Please send letters to the relevant authorities listed below voicing your condemnation of this forced eviction.

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