Paris Peace Accords 23 Oct. 1991

Tuesday, January 16, 2018

Hun Sen marks 33 years in power

Prime Minister Hun Sen tries his hand at piloting a cyclo at a meeting with cyclo drivers in Phnom Penh yesterday. Facebook
Prime Minister Hun Sen tries his hand at piloting a cyclo at a meeting with cyclo drivers in Phnom Penh yesterday. Facebook

Hun Sen marks 33 years in power

Phnom Penh Post | 15 January 2018

Prime Minister Hun Sen marked 33 years in power yesterday, claiming he had maintained his tight grip on power through democratic, not dictatorial, means – while also lamenting that he was unable to step down due to the Kingdom’s needs.

On January 14, 1985, Hun Sen was voted into power by his party members after the first prime minister of the Vietnam-backed Cambodian government, Pen Sovann, fell out of favour with Hanoi and his successor, Chan Si, passed away.
At a gathering of 5,000 tuk-tuk drivers and motodops, the premier yesterday prided himself on ruling the country by securing unanimous party votes in 1985 and through elections, not through violence – an apparently selective reading of history.
“We have lived for 33 years not from the barrel of a gun and not under a dictatorship,” Hun Sen said.
The “real dictators”, he said, were the Khmer Rouge’s Pol Pot and US-backed former Prime Minister Lon Nol, who nonetheless could not sustain power for as long as he had.
“I have no ambition to become prime minister. The person who wants to retire cannot because the country requires him,” Hun Sen added.
Last September, the premier pledged in a speech to remain in power for another decade.
But Hun Sen, in his speech, glossed over perhaps the most pivotal moment of his long rule. In 1997, his forces took up arms and carried out a bloody campaign to oust the royalist Funcinpec party – the winner of the 1993 elections – and its leader, then-“First Prime Minister” Prince Norodom Ranariddh. Dozens of Funcinpec military officials were murdered in extrajudicial executions in the aftermath of the fighting.
Threats of violence have surfaced more recently as well, including in May when Hun Sen said he was willing to “eliminate 100 to 200 people” to preserve stability if faced with the possibility of regime change.
The premier has in recent years steered away from overt violence in favour of softer sleights of hand, including rewriting laws in order to squeeze out his political opponents. His Cambodian People’s Party rammed through a number of legal amendments hobbling the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, and in September, he had party leader Kem Sokha arrested – a move that drew widespread condemnation as undermining any pretence of democracy. The party was later dissolved over accusations it was fomenting a foreign-backed “revolution”.
Hing Soksan, former director of the youth wing of the CNRP, said Hun Sen’s vice-like grip on the premiership was “done by tricks, oppression, fraud and deception”.
“The chance [for leadership] is not offered to the youths in the next generation,” he said.  
Prime Minister Hun Sen visits an exhibition of military hardware and exercises on Phnom Penh’s Koh Pich on Saturday.
Prime Minister Hun Sen visits an exhibition of military hardware and exercises on Phnom Penh’s Koh Pich on Saturday. Sreng Meng Srun
While Soksan acknowledged certain achievements under Hun Sen’s rule – such as infrastructure development in Phnom Penh, and Cambodia’s transformation from a “war-torn country to a peaceful one” – he said the Kingdom’s resources had been decimated and its people abused in the process, adding that the premier had “no ability” to develop the country further.
“We can see that when he leads for 30 years, he has ability to lead his family and affiliates to become rich, while millions of people remain living in hunger . . . and their rights have been violated and restricted,” he said.
Cambodian People’s Party spokesman Sok Eysan, however, deflected criticisms while praising the premier for “huge victories” – chief among them the oft-repeated mantra of “peace and development” and the “win-win” strategy to reintegrate Khmer Rouge soldiers into the government in the late 1990s.
“This [criticism] is just the analysis and unilateral opinion of an individual; the truth of history will not be able to fade away,” he said.
But social analyst Meas Nee warned that when leaders remained in charge for too long, it becomes easier for them to abuse their power.
“I feel he has done some incredible things for Cambodia, but I think 33 years is too long – he should figure out how to transfer the leadership,” Nee said. “When any leader stays too long, power becomes centralised between themselves and their family . . . [to the point where they] hold the country both politically and economically.”
He added the recent crackdown on the opposition and dissenting voices had put Cambodia on an international watch list. With the opposition dissolved, some media outlets closed and the constant warnings of “colour revolution” justifying repression, it was doubtful Cambodia was on the “right track”.
“Many people think it is not yet a total dictatorship, but it might not be far away. He declares he’s not a dictator, but more and more people think it’s moving to dictatorship,” Nee added.
Human Rights Watch’s Phil Robertson yesterday said Hun Sen’s “determination to hold on to power has been both relentless and ruthless”, while not shying away from “intimidation and violence against anyone he thinks poses a threat to his power”.
“Hun Sen hides his dictatorial ways behind a fig leaf of elections which he subverts,” he said in an email. “Any real threat to continued CPP dominance of the polls is done away with quietly and expeditiously so that it appears that Hun Sen is unassailable.”






20 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:04 PM

    This Vietcong slave Hun Sen is ridiculous. Hun Sen very stupid, cheap and dumb. He does not know what he was doing to show himself how stupid he is in the public.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous10:06 PM

    The folks or groups with a Vietcong puppet Hun Sen are also very stupid and dumb.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous6:25 AM

    Mocking HUN SEN - KD, could you post this one for me please? Thanks. SN.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2ChyzBVgnQ


    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous6:32 AM

    Hun Sen looks better as a cyclo driver than he looks as a PM.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous7:28 AM

      Well then, I am withdrawing my request. Thanks.

      Delete
  5. Anonymous6:47 AM

    Well, it appears to me that Mr. Hun Sen is still strong and vigor such that he can still drive a cyclo. I bet most of you old jokes are in wheelchairs and cannot drive a cycle.

    LOL...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous7:07 AM

      6:47 AM, WRONG! we can bang you Viet-biatch, non-stop, now that you Viet-Biatch constantly advertised how hot you Viet-Biatch were/ARE to the French, Americans, Russians, Chinkies and everyone else around the world - are we old jokes right? I bet we, old jokes are 100% right. So DrgunZet, let's see your tail between your legs and get out of T2P and never coming back! You know who I am already...

      Delete
    2. Anonymous7:20 AM

      And... who are you? LOL... Gosh, you are nasty and vulgar.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous8:16 AM

      Your worst nightmare Ah racist DrgunZet @7:20 am. Got it?

      Delete
    4. Anonymous8:19 AM

      Go, sound the alarm. Bring your reinforcement here to debate with me. I will own you all.

      Delete
    5. Anonymous8:28 AM

      Ah racist DrgunZet @8:19 AM, you have been kicked out of every blog/site on the WWW. Now you have incriminated yourself just as expected. No living soul on this planet earth wants to even see you RACIST VIET/YUON on their page/site/blog let alone debate with you except report you to the AUTHORITY!

      Delete
    6. Anonymous9:03 AM

      I thought you folks are a bunch of racists. You must report yourselves. I pray for President Trump to deport more Khmers back to Cambodia to teach you folks a lesson.

      Want me to contact President Trumps? He said Mexican illegal migrants are a bunch of rapists. If he knows Khmers as rapists and killers, what will he say?

      Delete
    7. Anonymous9:15 AM

      This is what TRUMP will say to you, you Racist VIET/YUON DrGunZet @9:03 AM:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mevxenJ6Mtc

      Delete
    8. Anonymous9:45 AM

      History lesson for you.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clHML5nywJU

      Want me to send it to President Trump as well? Really, I cannot imagine a more brutal race... Just look at those killers, do they look like Vietnamese or Khmer?

      Delete
    9. Anonymous9:54 AM

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mevxenJ6Mtc

      Trump knows who's the real killer of the Killing Fields is: The racist Viet/YUON like you DrGunZet, the ethnics cleanser of the Khmer's race!

      Delete
  6. Anonymous10:06 AM

    Learn some peace.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_movement

    When I was a teen, I used to fight on the street against dark-skinned kids. They attacked me and I must defended myself. As a result, I inflicted many brain damages to those evil dark-skinned kids.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous10:12 AM

    Brutal people, why hit a poor young girl on the head. She stole because she was poor and hungry. Oh my God, why Cambodia has so much brutality?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:15 AM

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mevxenJ6Mtc

      Trump knows who's the real killer of the Killing Fields is: The racist Viet/YUON like you DrGunZet, the ethnics cleanser of the Khmer's race

      Delete
    2. Anonymous10:42 AM

      Oops, I forgot to include the Youtube link of a poor Cambodian girl caught stealing. She was poor and hungry but was beaten nonetheless. Grrrr...now I cannot find the link again.

      It's terrible in Cambodia. FIX IT NOW!

      Delete
  8. Anonymous11:06 AM

    Oops, DrGunZet, the racist Viet/YUON terrorizing the Khmer people here on T2P for so long got caught incriminating himself red handed!!!

    Now, Drgunzet:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mevxenJ6Mtc




    ReplyDelete