Abbott's dirty deal with Cambodia will condemn refugees to destitution

The Abbott government plans to send hundreds of refugees to Cambodia. Ironically, many poor Cambodians are displaced refugees in their own country

Sarah Hanson-Young / The Guardian | 23 November 2014

‘The Abbott government knows full well that it won’t be able to support the refugees that it dumps in Cambodia.’ Photograph: Supplied

Like many five-year-olds in Cambodia, Samang must work for a living. He spends his days collecting drink cans from the rubbish dump that doubles as his home and then takes them to his grandmother, who crushes them with a brick. His grandmother does her best to care for him after his mother left Cambodia to find work in Thailand because there are no jobs in Phnom Penh. He is HIV positive.

I travelled to Cambodia to see what life will be like for the refugees the Abbott government plans to send there. Ironically, Cambodians like Samang have become refugees in their own country. Slum dwellers in the capital, Phnom Penh, have had their land and homes grabbed from under them by developers, and are pushed out onto the streets without any compensation. 

Samang’s story is tragic, but it’s also common in a country that has been destroyed by brutal civil war, poverty and decades of endemic corruption. Human rights abuses are on the rise as the government cracks down on those who challenge the corrupt justice system and public services. Only last week, seven local mothers were jailed for a year for peacefully protesting the government’s inaction over sewage that floods their homes and children’s school on a regular basis. 

Most of all, I fear for the young women and girls who Australia will send here. The sex trade is rife in Cambodia and young women are almost without protection. Orphanages in Cambodia are still full of young girls and boys, taken from poor homes with the promise of food and education, who are then exploited and sold for sex and labour. Clearly it is no place for Australia to be sending families who came to us asking for protection.

I met a young Rohingyan refugee named Tayab who has lived in Phnom Penh for several years. He has no officially recognised residency or citizenship and, therefore, none of the basic human rights that come with it. He cannot travel, get a job or own a vehicle. He survives by cooking roti every morning and selling it to passers-by on the street. Without official identification papers, it’s the best he can do.

“There is no future for me here,” he told me as we sat in in his cramped flat, “I want to leave but I can’t. Without papers, if I do leave, I will have to do it illegally.”

After a long pause, he added: “This deal, with Australia, it is very bad luck for the refugees.”

‘The vast majority of Cambodians work in low paying, unstable and informal jobs.’ Children in Phnom Penh. Photograph: Supplied

The Cambodian and Australian governments have been tight-lipped about the details of the refugee deal. At a farcical signing ceremony in September, the media snapped photos of the immigration ministers clinking champagne glasses but were ignored when they tried to ask questions about the new arrangement. What we do know, largely from Senate estimates questioning, is that refugees will be sent there by the end of the year. Australia will pay $40m plus costs for the privilege and, after a short time spent in the country’s capital, refugees will be dumped in regional Cambodia and told to get on with their lives.

Regional Cambodia’s rice fields and stunning natural beauty are interposed with scenes of stark destitution. The vast majority of Cambodians work in low paying, unstable and informal jobs – and this is especially true in the regions. 

While visiting one of the villages in the rural province of Battambang, I spoke to parents at the local school. The overwhelming majority of them told me they had to travel to Thailand to work (often illegally) to earn enough money to survive. Unless you already own land and can grow rice, there are no jobs in the regional areas. What jobs will the refugees Australia sends here actually be able to perform? None, as far as I can see. There’s no work in Phnom Penh either – many are likely to take the locals’ advice and head across the border, where the wages are better.

Right now, there are 63 refugees and 21 asylum seekers in Cambodia. That’s a mere 84 potential refugees in the whole country. NGOs told me that they can’t care adequately for even that small number. There are more than 1,200 asylum seekers on Nauru, including families and children. All will be sent to Cambodia if the Australian government gets its way. The Abbott government is willing to pay to set this deal up, but the country clearly can’t cope with such a significant influx of vulnerable people.

While the politicians in Canberra might have decided to condemn the refugees on Nauru to a life of poverty and hardship, Australians deserve to know about the realities of life in Cambodia. They need to know about Tayab, poor young Samang and they need to know the truth: this dirty deal with Cambodia will condemn hundreds of families to a life of senseless and cruel destitution.

The Abbott government knows full well that it won’t be able to support the refugees that it dumps in Cambodia. Alarmingly, it doesn’t care.