GENERAL APPEAL(Cambodia): Turning off fresh water supply; flooding villages; filling up a lake to force eviction of residents living on the banks in Phnom Penh

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has learned with great alarm that the Phnom Penh Municipality has resorted to certain draconian measures.  It turned off the fresh water supply. It flooded villages by filling up Boeung Kak Lake in Phnom Penh in an attempt to evict thousands of families living on the banks.  These eviction tactics are being resisted. The Municipality has leased the entire lake and its bank to Sukaku Company for development for 99 years for USD 79 million. It is pressuring these families to accept unjust compensation and vacate the area.

CASE DETAILS: (Sources: Chhung Chu Ngy, lawyer; Phom Penh; Am Sam Ath, LICADHO human rights NGO, Phnom Penh; an unidentified resident)

In February 2007, the Phnom Penh Municipality signed a lease awarding a contract to the Sukaku development company. They were given the right to fill in Boeung Kak Lake and use the reclaimed land for development. The lake and its bank altogether comprise 133 hectares. The lease runs for 99 years against payment of USD 79 million to the authorities. Sukaku’s project includes a commercial centre, a university, a leisure centre and/or luxury housing estates.

Over 4,000 families are living on and around the lake. After the contract was finalized, the HSC sand-dredging company laid pipeline from Tonle Sap River to the lake. The filling in of the lake was postponed under after the July election for fear of losing support for the ruling party. Work started in August 2008. The lake residents became alarmed, took to the streets and staged a protest in front of city hall.  The families demanded that they be furnished with legal entitlement to their land and just compensation should they vacate their homes and lands.

The authorities met with over 400 of the residents and offered them three forms of compensation: (1) new houses to be built in the Boeung Kak Lake area; (2) houses in a resettlement area on the outskirts of Phnom Penh plus 2 millions riels (USD 500); and (3) compensation in cash of up to USD 8,000.  According to the same authorities, 434 out of 1172 families who have their houses built on the lake itself have accepted one or other of these forms of compensation. However, those who have accepted houses in the resettlement area have been disappointed with the quality of the houses provided. They lack basic public services such as running water, electricity, and thrash collection, which serve as a deterrent to other lake residents taking up these options.

The rest of the lake residents have remained on their land. They found the proposed forms of compensation “inadequate” because: the relocation site is too far away from their jobs, lacks both social infrastructure and transportation into town; USD 8,000 cash compensation is too low to buy a house in town where house prices are many times higher; a long wait for new houses to be built with high house rents to be paid while waiting. The residents are demanding compensation equivalent to the market price of the land they are occupying.

The municipal authorities have dismissed their demands, claiming that they have no right to make such demands, arguing that the residents have occupied public state land.

While they were in the process of rejecting the authorities’ offer, the sand-dredging company, on 26 August 2008 started its filling operations which raised the level of the water in the lake. The residents requested suspension of the filling operation but to no avail. Now many sections of streets and lanes in the villages on the bank have been flooded, making it difficult for residents to travel back and forth.

Furthermore, on September 22, over 100 families living on the lake found that their running water supply was suddenly stopped without any prior notice, forcing them to buy water at high prices from vendors. Lake residents have received threats to cut off their power supply.  Unidentified people have destroyed the floating, water morning-glory vegetable that some residents have grown on the lake to earn their living.

Lake residents have seen that the filling in of the lake, the resulting flooding and the cut off of tap water are means by which the authorities seek to pressure them into accepting the municipal authorities’ offer and vacate the area in favor of the Sukaku Company.

This is yet another form of forced eviction that has surfaced now that openly forced evictions   have been widely condemned. A blockade has been used before to cut off food supplies in the eviction of the Dey Kraham community in Phnom Penh (AHRC-UAU-006-2008) and of villagers in Kompong Thom province (AHRC-UAG-003-2008).

They have filed a complaint in the court of first instance in Phnom Penh to secure an injunction to stop the filling in of the lake. But on September 22, the court ruled against issuing such an injunction, saying that it had jurisdiction only over registered lands. Their lands were not registered. Their case was under the jurisdiction of the Cadastral Committee. They have now appealed this court decision.

In parallel with their protests they have also called upon their Prime Minister, who has supported land -grabbing victims in the past, and the Parliament, to stop the devastating filling in of the lake. They asked help in securing compensation equivalent to the market price of their lands, ranging from USD 1,500 to USD 2,000 per square meter.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

The Sukaku Company is a local company whose director is Senator Lao Meng Khin, a member of the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP). It is widely known that the rich and powerful are involved in land grabbing. In 2007 Prime Minister Hun said that land gabbers were “CPP officials” and “people in power”.

According to Cambodia’s Land Law (2001), lakes are public state land (Art.15) and as such cannot be sold or leased (Art. 16). So the lease of Boeung Kak Lake by the Phnom Penh Municipality in February 2007 was illegal. But in August 2008, in order to legalize the lease, the government made it into private state land, which according to the same law can be sold or leased (Art. 17). Still, the same lease, which was an economic land concession, was in breach of the government sub-decree on economic land concessions which requires, among other things, prior public consultations, which had not been conducted.

Many of Beoung Kak Lake residents have been peacefully occupying the contested land since the early 1980s without any protest from the authorities. Well before the enactment of the Land Law and, by virtue of its Art. 30, they should be entitled to the lands they have occupied. In Cambodia, courts of law are widely known to be under political control and also under the influence of the rich and powerful.

Almost in the heart of Phnom Penh city, Boeung Kak Lake is known as a “unique” spot in the city, from an environmental point of view. It will be a great loss to all citizens if the lake is filled up.

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please write letters to the authorities listed below requesting them to suspend the lake filling operation, turn on the tap water supplies to all lake residents, pay compensation which is commensurate with the market price of their homes and lands, and desist from all forms of forced eviction.

Please be informed that the AHRC has also written separate letters to the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, Special Representative of the Secretary-General of human rights in Cambodia and OHCHR in Cambodia calling for intervention in this case.

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