Two years ago, a man named Pol Suon and his crew of workers cleared the landmines from a 12-hectare site in Poipet commune, O’Chrou district, in Banteay Meanchey province.
Pol Suon set up a new village, calling it Samaky Meanchey. In short order, more than 400 families bought plots, built houses and moved in.
But local officials say the land Samaky Meanchey was built on is part of a larger site that was legally sold to 34 other people in 1997. The site lies between the town’s only market and the lucrative Golden Casino in an area of sharply escalating land values.
Poipet commune chief Sok Ponn said among those owners are two top government officials: RCAF General Kun Kim, an adviser to Prime Minister Hun Sen; and Hem Theng, the former immigration chief in Poipet.
Kun Kim, contacted by telephone, said he does not own the land. Hem Theng could not be reached for comment.
Regardless of who owns it, the villagers say they have been wronged and emotions are running high. Fifteen people, including Pol Suon and his crew, were arrested as the land dispute intensified, while officials and NGO workers say the authorities are violating the law.
The case illustrates how serious land disputes have become in Poipet, where three casinos have sparked an economic boom and two more are planned. At least twice in recent weeks, villagers have asked officials to protect them.
The trouble over Samaky Meanchey began in late July, when commune chief Sok Ponn went to the village to tell residents they would have to leave, because other people owned the land and the village was “unauthorized.’’
Sar Chamrong, O’Chrou district chief, said Pol Suon and his men “set up an autonomous village without our administrative order.”
“This is like forming a state [within a] sovereign state,” he said.
As Sok Ponn was meeting with the villagers, Pol Suon found out about it and was upset. He argued with villagers outside the meeting place and his men prevented some of them from going inside.
Police were summoned, and Pol Suon and 14 others were arrested and charged with detaining three villagers and slightly injuring two others. Several eyewitnesses said those arrested were beaten severely and hit with rifle butts by police.
Within hours, about 100 supporters of Pol Suon boarded trucks to travel to the Banteay Meanchey provincial capital of Sisophon and demand the 15 be released, said Nhem Sarath, an investigator for the human rights organization Adhoc.
Kim Suor Phirith, the Sam Rainsy Party parliamentarian who represents Banteay Meanchey province, deplored what he called “grave human rights abuses” by the police.
The arrests are illegal, Kim Suor Phirith said, “because they had no court order. They can’t detain the suspects more than 48 hours as dictated by the penal law.”
Chan Sambath, an officer for the ZOA Refugee Care Netherlands NGO in Poipet, said Samaky Meanchey isn’t the only village on the 3,500-meter by 450-meter site. Another 150 families live in neighboring Santapheap village, and they face possible eviction too.
The families, meanwhile, worry that eviction is inevitable, now that Pol Suon has been arrested. District chief Sar Chamrong said there are no plans to evict people yet.
Pol Suon and the others were arrested for assault, not over the land dispute, Sar Chamrong said. Banteay Meanchey’s prosecutor, You Bunchheng, says no trial date has been set because the investigation is continuing.
Local NGO workers say such cases show that the population of homeless and landless people in Poipet keeps growing.
In June, more than 900 families were evicted from the Poipet railway station and relocated to Prey Kup, a village of about 30 hectares situated 13 kilometers from town.
Many complain that the area surrounding Prey Kup is heavily mined. Within weeks of relocating, two people were badly injured by exploding landmines as they cut bamboo in the forest to build housing.
A dozen villagers came to Phnom Penh in late July to try and convince the Sam Rainsy Party to help them. They say living in Prey Kup is worse than squatting in the train station, which was at least in the town center where they had clean water and could earn money.
“We have been dumped’’ in Prey Kup, said a 43-year-old man, who asked not to be named. He said families there don’t have much freedom to speak or even chat with their neighbors. If more than four people meet, they are monitored by local authorities for fear they might be planning turmoil, he charged.
In June, tensions in Prey Kup boiled over and seven people were arrested on June 23. One woman says she and her husband were detained overnight by police when they complained about being defrauded.
She said they had been evicted from one site and given land elsewhere. But when the new site turned out to be in an area set aside for market expansion, it was taken again—this time by the village chief.
O’Chrou District Chief, Sar Chamrong, denied that families relocated to Prey Kup have been watched or pressured by local authorities.
But he admitted that there is no drinking water, because no suitable site for a well has been found. Officials and NGOs workers said that a group of water supply experts dispatched by the Water Resource Ministry has been testing for underground water.
Chan Sambath of the ZOA NGO said the government and courts must plan carefully before evicting people, so that families and NGOs can work together to solve such problems.
“The government should have proper land for people before forcing them out of one area,’’ he said. “”Otherwise, there’ll be more problems like this.”
