Malai Comrades Say Rocket Attack Was ‘Warning Shot’
malai district, Banteay Meanchey province – After a rocket was fired at the home of Pailin Governor Y Chhien last month, officials in Pailin had an immediate explanation for the attack: political terrorism by forces intent on overthrowing the government.
But in Malai town, Y Chhien’s old Khmer Rouge comrades scoff at the suggestion. They say the rocket was shot not by terrorists, but by former Khmer Rouge members in Pailin who are disgruntled over the uneven distribution of wealth and business opportunities.
“That was a warning shot for Y Chhien,” said a former Khmer Rouge senior official who, unwilling to jeopardize his relationship with the administration in Pailin, requested anonymity.
Pailin’s leaders have grown rich from the area’s gem mining industry, the one-time large-scale logging business and Thai gamblers who now visit the town’s casino. But the majority of Pailin’s people grow disillusioned as the financial dividend from peace has yet to reach them, the official said.
“That [attack] was nothing from outside. That is an internal matter [in Pailin],” he said. “Don’t try to find other people to blame this on.”
Malai officials are also taking the attack as a warning of problems that can come with development.
Malai, like Pailin, Samlot and other areas in the northwest region near the Thai border, was once the jungle redoubt of Khmer Rouge forces who fought the government in Phnom Penh until 1996, when a mass defection saw the area end its long-standing war.
While reintegration with the government has brought peace and differing degrees of development to these former battle zones, the rewards have not been distributed evenly, Malai officials say.
Pailin’s economic ability to earn cash from outside investors outstrips that of Malai, which badly needs more economic activity.
But the area must not do what Pailin has done, and alienate ordinary people in the process, warned Phea Phoun, Malai district deputy chief, and one time staff member of Democratic Kampuchea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “We will protect [to make sure] Malai does not become a bad place,” he said.
“The problem is that some people have money, but so many others in Pailin do not,” Phea Phoun said. “During the fighting everyone was the same. Now the people do not even have money to go to hospital. This is why those people fired the rocket.”
The growing economic disparity, and ensuing animosity, between those who led the Khmer Rouge and those who did the fighting, has not been lost on Democratic Kampuchea’s one-time leaders who now live out their old age in the northwest, Phea Phoun said.
“They are not happy. But they do not interfere with the new generation. Now they are not involved in administration. They are only ordinary citizens,” he said.
“[The feuding] is regretful. But we do not know how to stop it,” he added.
The former high-ranking official under Democratic Kampuchea agrees that the 4-year-old peace has brought differing degrees of benefit to the former Khmer Rouge zones.
“We have the same problems as all of Cambodia now,” he said. “I think it is normal…. this is the price of freedom.”
Y Chhien remains adamant that the rocket attack on his home Oct 17 was a political act perpetrated by people outside the area and not linked to an internal matter.
“This is not a problem related to business in the Pailin area,” he said. “I am not involved in any case regarding business in Pailin that caused my house to be attacked.”
And Y Chhien denies claims that the people of Pailin are unhappy with the district’s leaders because they are not sharing in the wealth reaching the area since reintegration.
“After defecting to the government we provided land to the people and now that we are under the government, the people can do business. I think this is good for them,” Y Chhien said.
But he acknowledged some people in Pailin do not support him.
“Many people like me. But it does not mean that all the people like me. This is normal,” he said. “Even if we have the same mother, we still have disputes in the family.”
Pailin’s First Deputy Governor Ieng Vuth said a leaflet from the Cambodian Freedom Fighters warning that an incident was about to take place in Pailin was discovered in nearby Samlot district by military authorities before the rocket attack.
The US-based group surfaced two years ago claiming they would maintain an armed resistance against Hun Sen’s government, which the organization labels a puppet of Vietnam.
Chea Chandin, deputy police chief of Pailin, said seven or eight men climbed a fence surrounding the governor’s compound and fired a B-40 rocket onto the grounds of the house.
Y Chhien was not home and no one was injured in the attack. Three of Y Chhien’s children, and six others were in the house at the time.
The attackers were pursued on foot by police, but escaped into the jungle. One suspect, described as a Cambodian businessman was arrested two days after the attack, said Chea Chandin.
Hearing of problems in Pailin has made Malai officials cautious, but they are not turning their backs on investment opportunities. Indeed, the money being made in Pailin is too tempting to pass up.
After reintegration, Malai was one of the first areas on the border that Thai businessmen approached with plans for a casino. Considering the social consequences, Malai officials turned down the proposal.
Malai officials may be more accepting to the idea these days, Phea Phoun said. But the casino would be run in an entirely different manner to the Pailin casino, with profits in Malai going to development, he added.
“We need the money. The income in Malai is not good,” he said. “When we look at the places that have casinos, we see that their [infrastructure] is much better developed.
