Cambodia's political Facebook war heads to court

By BBC TrendingWhat's popular and why
15 March 2016

Official Facebook page of Hun SenImage copyrightFacebook

Suggestions that underhand tactics have been used to artificially boost the Facebook popularity of Cambodia's leader has resulted in a lawsuit against an opposition leader and denials that "likes" have been bought from foreign "click farms".
Prime Minister Hun Sen has ruled Cambodia for more than 30 years, but recently he's become very interested in technology and social networking.
In September he admitted that a page with his name on it was actually his official Facebook home, and since then the number of likes the page has picked up has climbed steadily. Last month he eclipsed the like count racked up by opposition leader Sam Rainsy.

Sam RainsyImage copyrightGetty Images
Image captionOpposition leader Sam Rainsy lives in self-imposed exile but most of his Facebook supporters appear to come from inside Cambodia.


But with the burst of social media activity have come criticism and questions. Rainsy, who was already living in self-imposed exile to avoid another lawsuit, accused government ministers of pressuring members of the ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP) to like the prime minister on Facebook, and of boosting the PM's numbers with fake accounts from overseas.
This prompted a furious response from Som Soeun, a minister who oversees Hun Sen's online presence and who has now launched a lawsuit against Rainsy seeking $5,000 compensation for allegedly "twisting the truth". Soeun said that it was untrue that he had advocated using fake accounts overseas to boost the PM's Facebook likes.
"It is not like that at all," he told the English-language Cambodia Daily. "I am a party member; I have to protect my leader and expose His Excellency Sam Rainsy's cheap act, which is opposite to the truth.