Hundreds of mourners gathered at the Ministry of Education Tuesday morning to pay their respects to Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Tol Lah, who died Monday. He was 60.
Tol Lah, a senior Funcinpec official and prominent member of the Cham Muslim community, had been ill for several years, and succumbed to emphysema after years of heavy smoking, his doctor Tep Lun said Tuesday.
Tol Lah died in his Phnom Penh home around 8 pm Monday, Tep Lun said.
His Tuesday morning funeral ceremony was attended by several high-ranking Funcinpec officials, members of the Cham community, teachers and officials from the Education Ministry. Some officials from the Sam Rainsy Party and the the CPP were also present at the ceremony.
Negotiations between CPP and Funcinpec over the formation of
a new government, initially planned for Tuesday morning, were postponed due to the funeral, officials said. The talks are scheduled to resume Thursday.
After the ceremony, Tol Lah’s body was taken by helicopter to his home village in Battambang province for burial, said Pok Than, Funcinpec’s secretary of state for the ministry.
Pok Than, who has been acting as Funcinpec’s top representative at the ministry for the past year because of Tol Lah’s ill health, is expected to continue his role in the ministry until a new government is formed, Funcinpec officials said Tuesday.
“We deeply feel sorrow for losing him. He’s a very good leader,” Pok Than said Tuesday. “He worked a lot to reform education in Cambodia.”
Others also expressed grief over the death of their friend and colleague.
“This is a big loss, just like when a son loses his father,” said Ismael Osman, Funcinpec’s undersecretary of state for the Ministry of Cult and Religions, and honorary president of Islamic Brotherhood Development in Cambodia.
Ismael Osman said Tol Lah had helped build schools and contributed to the development of Cham communities throughout the country.
He said that Tol Lah’s role in the government, as deputy prime minister and minister, was groundbreaking for ethnic Chams. Tol Lah was the first Cham to be appointed deputy prime minister.
According to his biography, Tol Lah was born in Norea commune in Battambang province’s Sangke district. He emigrated to the US in 1975.
In the early 1980s, he returned to the Cambodian-Thai border, joining the resistance movement against Vietnamese occupation. He was later appointed lieutenant general of the Sihanoukist army.
Tol Lah was appointed secretary-general of the National Assembly in 1993, working closely with Funcinpec President Prince Norodom Ranariddh.
He became minister of education in 1995, a stint that was briefly interrupted during the 1997 factional fighting. He regained the position after the 1998 election, and served as secretary-general of Funcinpec until 2001 when he was replaced by Prince Norodom Sirivudh.
(Additional reporting by Kim Chan)
