The Phnom Penh municipality has threatened to confiscate a prime city lot from its owner if hundreds of thousands of dollars allegedly paid for the state-owned property in 1992 are not located by investigators.
Governor Chea Sophara said Monday the land—situated opposite of Phnom Penh’s Hotel Sofitel Cambodiana—will be confiscated if the Ministry of Finance cannot locate some $350,000 allegedly paid for the land that once belonged to the city.
Announcing the investigation at the municipality’s weekly meeting Monday, Chea Sophara said he believes the money will not be found and that former municipal officials acted unlawfully when they sold the roughly 7,000 square-meter plot.
“The most important thing is the [payment]. We haven’t seen the payment,” Chea Sophara said.
“The private sector cannot just take this land….I think there was corruption inside [the municipality],” Chea Sophara said. He told those at the meeting he plans to use the land for a public park.
Nget Chaddavy, director of the municipality’s finance department, confirmed Tuesday that a group of municipal experts will be sent to the Finance Ministry to clarify if the money was logged there.
However, Nget Chaddavy said he is doubtful the money will be found. “I already know and believe that no money from the sale was sent to the national budget account,” he said.
According to municipal officials and documents distributed at Monday’s meeting, the plot of land was sold to a man named Seng Elin for $350,000 in 1992 by former Cambodiana Hotel developer and lease-holder Huy Koeung.
The sale was made one month after Huy Koeung was given permission to develop the site by then-President of the People’s Committee of Phnom Penh, Hok Lundy.
Neither Huy Koeung nor Seng Elin could be contacted Tuesday.
Hok Lundy, who is now director-general of the National Police, declined to comment.
A senior government lawyer who did not want to be identified confirmed that Huy Koeung was allowed to lease the hotel and the disputed land to develop in the early 1990s.
However, the hotel developer did not have permission to sell the land for profit.
“The government should take back the land….The government granted [Huy Koeung] the land to develop—not to sell to another businessman for private gain,” the lawyer said.
In 1993 Untac moved to curb the improper sale of state-owned property by government officials. At that time the UN documented significant land holdings by the government, many of which were illegally sold for the benefit of individuals or transferred to political parties without cost.
In two directives, Untac required officials to register all transactions involving state property, citing “cases of state commercial property being transferred to individuals or to a political party without cost.”
This situation, the directive said, “presents a serious erosion of the public wealth.”
Municipal officials said Tuesday they did not know the whereabouts the disputed plot’s owner.
Corrugated metal fencing surrounding the strip of vacant land will be removed early next week and the area landscaped as a public garden, said Nhem Saran, director of the Municipal Public Works and Transportation department.
He said the work will be completed in time for the annual water festival in November.
