A
charismatic student, she rocketed to fame during the 2013 elections
when she backed the opposition’s effort to unseat Cambodia’s
authoritarian ruler. Her Facebook page drew hundreds of thousands of followers, making her, at 18, perhaps the most powerful voice of her generation.
The opposition nearly won the election, but protests over the vote led to a government crackdown.
By November, the political battle had come down to a single standoff:
The government threatened to arrest the opposition leader, Sam Rainsy,
if he set foot in Cambodia again. Mr. Sam Rainsy, who was traveling
abroad, vowed to return.
Ms. Thy Sovantha put out a call on YouTube and rallied hundreds of her supporters to meet him at the airport.
But at the last minute, he canceled his flight and fled to France.
The question is a riddle in Cambodia, which has been stuck in roughly the same political cycle for decades.
For 30 years, Prime Minister Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge
fighter, has wielded power through a combination of threats, clever
deal-making and sheer willpower. And for most of that time, Mr. Sam
Rainsy, a French-educated former finance minister, has been his foil.
Some commentators here compare the pair to Tom and Jerry.
Mr. Hun Sen, who met with President Obama at a regional summit meeting in California
this week, tolerates periods of relative freedom and political dissent
to a point, but resorts to coups, crackdowns and court cases when
serious challenges arise.
Mr.
Sam Rainsy is now as well known for fleeing the country in the face of
legal threats as he is for his reform-minded agenda. His retreat to
France was his third in a decade.
For
many Cambodians, the 2013 election was the biggest opportunity yet to
break out of that rut. Youth like Ms. Thy Sovantha were a central part
of that hope, as a demographic shift gave them a larger say than ever
before.
Two-thirds
of the population is under 30, making Cambodia one of the youngest
nations in Asia, according to United Nations estimates. The first
generation to grow up after the horrors of the Khmer Rouge
regime faded and the economy began to grow at a rapid clip, they are
better educated and more skeptical than previous generations.
Increasingly, they get their news online rather than from traditional
television and print news media, which are dominated by the governing
party.
Politically, they are restless, having outgrown the authoritarian style and patronage system of Mr. Hun Sen.
“I feel disappointed and hopeless,” said Ms. Thy Sovantha, now 20.
His decision not to return to Cambodia, analysts say, was a lost opportunity, if not a surprise.
The ruling Cambodian People’s Party gloated at the retreat. “In simple terms, he’s a coward,” a party spokesman told The Cambodia Daily.
But even his supporters were disappointed.
Ou
Ritthy, 28, the founder of a youth political discussion group, said he
and his peers were exasperated with the cat-and-mouse game of Cambodian
politics.
“Hun
Sen, many things he has been doing are for power, for party interests,
and Sam Rainsy also does the same,” he said. “It’s old-style politics in
a new society.”
Mr. Ou Ritthy credits the sharp rise in Internet penetration and smartphone use for changing the dynamic here.
“Youth
have two things,” he said. “Information — they got informed from social
media — and smartphones. They are more independent in terms of
information. They are not told what to do by their parents like in the
past.”
After
two opposition lawmakers were dragged from their cars and severely
beaten in October, Facebook sleuths managed to identify several
attackers as members of government security forces.
Both parties are keenly aware of the demographic shift and are trying to chase the changing electorate.
In
his absence, Mr. Sam Rainsy has led town halls via Skype and shared
political commentary and vacation snapshots with his fans on his widely
followed Facebook page. Shirtless photos of him piloting watercraft at a luxury resort in the Philippines inspired heated debates on his character.
Mr. Hun Sen joined Facebook
in September and has taken to it with a vengeance. He is particularly
fond of posting candid snapshots of himself — sitting on the ground
slurping up street noodles, swathed in a medical gown receiving a
checkup, watering plants in a public garden and even taking selfies
during a regional summit meeting.
According
to a study by the public relations firm Burson-Marsteller, he already
ranks second among world leaders for engagement with Facebook followers.
He
is increasingly conducting government business on Facebook. He has made
several policy changes based on complaints posted to his personal page,
and last week, he announced the creation of dozens of “Facebook working
groups” to gather information about citizens’ concerns.
Sun
Heng, a 22-year-old university student, said he and most of his friends
followed both leaders on Facebook but were still skeptical about the
sexagenarians’ embrace of social media.
“For
me, I find it very pretentious: Sometimes it is so obvious that they
are acting,” he said. “But it can also be a good sign, showing that they
care what people think now.”
Mr. Sam Rainsy clearly believes he has demographics on his side because Cambodia’s young people want a change. He has vowed to return by the next election, in 2018.
“This
is for me the fourth time that I am forced into exile,” he said by
Skype from his home in Paris. “But eventually, each time, the situation
changes, and I always manage to be back in time.”
The question for Cambodia is whether his followers will still be waiting. Ms. Thy Sovantha seems to have moved on.
She
has told her followers, who now number 1.2 million, of her
disillusionment with Mr. Sam Rainsy. Her Facebook posts focus
increasingly on education and environmental issues rather than party
politics, and she is channeling her energy into starting a center for
homeless youth.
But she may not have entirely given up on the system. On her Facebook profile, she describes herself as “politician.”
Il faut qu'on fasse quelque chose de plus pour pouvoir changer la donne!
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