Several of Mam Sonando’s listeners decried the detention of the outspoken radio host on Thursday, while his wife said other reporters at independent Beehive 105 FM Radio will fill in for him while he remains in prison.
“We listen to [Mam Sonando] every morning with this,” said 31-year-old Chhoeurng Sokun, holding up a metallic blue radio at her grocery stall near Olympic Stadium.
“Nobody will fight back against the government if Mam Sonando is imprisoned,” she said.
“He always speaks the straightforward truth, which affects the listeners,” she added. “A lot of old people in the provinces cry for him.”
Motorbike taxi driver Doung Eouerng, 50, who works just down the street from Beehive’s offices on Street 360 near Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, said about 30 people gathered outside the station on Tuesday and Wednesday in support of the radio host.
About 10 people were gathered outside the station on Thursday morning.
Doung Eouerng said Mam Sonando helps protect people from land grabbing in his broadcasts.
“This radio station is very important to the democratic process, and if it’s closed, the root of the democratic process will be cut,” he said, adding that Mam Sonando did nothing wrong by discussing the border.
Denn Phanara, Mam Sonando’s wife, said his detention will not cripple the station.
“We have to continue our radio station rather than close it down,” she said, adding that the arrest wouldn’t hurt the station’s popularity.
Information Minister Khieu Kanharith could not be reached for comment.
Staff at Beehive said that the station can be heard in Kandal, Takeo, Kampot, Kompong Speu, Kompong Chhnang, Pursat, Kompong Cham, Kratie and Svay Rieng provinces.
The station didn’t reach far outside of Phnom Penh until they boosted their broadcasting power in 2003 with equipment purchased with $60,000 in donations from listeners and NGOs.
Tep Naroth, a monitor with local rights group Adhoc in Kampot, said the station is popular with villagers in the province because it provides accurate information, and broadcasts the controversial public forums organized by the Cambodian Center for Human Rights. Hun Sen is a staunch critic of the forums.
Back in Phnom Penh, Sem Chanthary, 21, a second year law student at Norton University, said defamation charges are not appropriate in Mam Sonando’s case.
“Mam Sonando’s suit cannot be a criminal case, because it is only people expressing themselves,” she said.