Farmers in Kompong Chhnang province locked in a land dispute with a local businesswoman are waiting for the government to make a decision on who owns the property after student volunteers measured the area earlier this month as part of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s nationwide land-titling program.
A team of student volunteers measured the 45 hectares of rice and cashew fields claimed by 76 families in Rolea Ba’ier district’s Kraing Leav commune on April 2 and 3. At the request of local businesswoman Moul Engly, the volunteers then measured the same area again on April 4.
“We measured the land for the villagers and we also measured it for Ms. Engly because she claimed that the land belongs to her and she also showed us certificates for the land,” said Song Ly, a student volunteer who led the survey team on its two expeditions.
Ms. Engly declined to comment further and referred all other questions to Por Vannith, who coordinates the student volunteers for the province. Mr. Vannith confirmed Wednesday that the team measured the disputed area twice, and that a decision on who to award the land to is pending.
“Our student volunteers just went to measure, but we did not give the land to any of the parties yet,” he said.
In a letter sent to The Cambodia Daily on Tuesday to clarify a previous report on the land dispute, Mr. Vannith said the survey team measured the land a second time at Ms. Engly’s request, and with the ultimate aim of settling the dispute.
“Upon the request of Ms. Moul Engly and her family we also measured it for them in order to know how big the disputed area was and how many families were involved, and the decision is waiting on a superior,” the statement says.
The statement does not specify which “superior” will make the final ownership judgment, and Mr. Vannith said that he was unaware of who that superior was.
Deputy district governor Cheng Ngann said that he was not dealing with the dispute, but he was aware that student volunteers had collected land documents from both parties in order to arrive at a decision.
“I heard that the district and commune authorities and student volunteers are collecting land certificates in order to compare them with each other,” he said.
Hem Chuon, whose family is among the 76 involved in the current dispute, insisted on Tuesday that that land belongs to the villagers.
“We occupied the land in the 1980s; we did not take someone else’s land,” she said.
Ms. Engly could not be reached for comment.
In his letter clarifying the role of the student volunteers in the land dispute, Mr. Vannith, the volunteers’ provincial coordinator, addressed a Supreme Court decision from 2010 involving a criminal case Ms. Engly had brought against eight local farmers for allegedly occupying her land illegally, and damaging her property.
While the Supreme Court ruled that the eight villages were not guilty of the allegations leveled by Ms. Engly, as had the Appeal Court before it, Mr. Vannith said the decision made by the Supreme Court had not settled the question of ownership over the land.
According to a copy of the Supreme Court decision provided by local rights group Adhoc, the court did say that the eight villagers had the right to keep farming on the land claimed by Ms. Engly.
“The Supreme Court understands that the eight villagers answered similarly that they did not go to damage anything on the land because they occupy it [already] and had farmed and grown cashews between 1981 and 1982 until the dispute in 2005,” according to court documents.
“So the villagers can continue to grow on the land; it is not illegal,” the Supreme Court said.
Local officials said the 45 hectares now in dispute included the land the Supreme Court ruled on in 2010.
It was not known Wednesday when a decision will be made on ownership of the contested land.
