A state-owned zoo in Takeo province has threatened to cease cooperating with an environmental NGO unless a senior staff member is replaced, officials said Tuesday.
However officials denied that the dispute was related to a controversial timber harvest which the Agriculture Ministry in September said was for the construction of a timber museum at the zoo.
Nhiek Rotannak Pich, director of the Phnom Tamao Wildlife Rescue Center in Bati district, said that Wildlife Alliance, formerly known as WildAid, was seeking to renew the tenure of its top staff member at the zoo. The zoo, however, will not accept this as the Wildlife Alliance staff had acted condescendingly towards Cambodians at the zoo, Nhiek Rotannak Pich said. He declined to identify the staffer.
Nick Marx of Wildlife Alliance, who chairs the rescued wildlife program at the zoo, referred all questions to the NGO’s country director, Suwanna Gauntlett, who was traveling Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.
Nhiek Rotannak Pich said that the issue was personal.
“He looked down on the Cambodian staff. All my staff cannot work with him,” he said, adding that the zoo would be able to continue working without Wildlife Alliance’s financial assistance.
“He always set conditions and threatened to cut aid,” Nhiek Rotannak Pich added.
Forestry Administration Director Ty Sokhun denied that the dispute at the zoo, which falls under his administration’s jurisdiction, was unrelated to a three-province timber harvest for an unspecified quantity of wood which officials said is for a planned museum at the zoo.
The Interior Ministry confirmed in September that it had launched an investigation as a result of complaints from Ratanakkiri province officials regarding the timber harvest.
When the plans for the wood museum were made public in September, both the zoo’s Deputy Director Pin Nivun and Marx told reporters they were unaware of any wood requested for the zoo.
“It’s not about the new museum,” Ty Sokhun said. “We have stopped cooperation. That is finished,” he said.
