ANATOMY OF A LAND DISPUTE: TWO CASESQOM WESTERN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 PHNOM PENH 000365

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP/MLS, DRL, AND OES--ANN STEWART AND PETER
O'DONOHUE
USAID FOR ANE/SPOTS--MARY MELNYK AND JOHN WILSON,
ANE/ESA--DEIDRE WINSTON AND DEBORAH KENNEDY-IRAHETA
BANGKOK FOR REO JIM WALLER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/21/2016
TAGS: PHUM PGOV SENV ECON CB
SUBJECT: ANATOMY OF A LAND DISPUTE: TWO CASESQOM WESTERN
CAMBODIA

REF: A. 05 PHNOM PENH 479


B. 06 PHNOM PENH 348

Classified By: Economics Officer Jennifer Spande for reason 1.4 (b).


1. SUMMARY. Land disputes affect 45% of the population of
the western province of Banteay Meanchey and 10% of the
population in neighboring Battambang province, according to
estimates by local NGO activists. During a Feb. 1-3 trip to
the region, Econoff and Econ FSN learned that such disputes
are on the rise. In some cases, government officials failed
to enforce decisions favorable to villagers or overturned the
decisions withoQ explanation. The use of frontmen and
pseudonyms on land titles, overlapping goverment claims, and
sometimes weak legal basis for villagers' land claims
contribute to NGO difficulty in taking a systemic approach in
tackling the issue. Villagers in Banteay Meanchey asserted
that, if necessary, they would resort to violence to defend
their land; while villagers in Battambang said that they
would continue to pursue their cases vigorously but without
using violence. END SUMMARY.

Battambang: Land Disputes in Cambodia's "Rice Bowl"
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2. (U) Known as the "rice bowl" of Cambodia, Battambang
province in Western Cambodia shares a long border with
Thailand and its provincial capital, also named Battambang,
is Cambodia's second largest city. Governor Prach Chan
related that Battambang saw protracted fighting during the
Khmer Rouge period and the ensuing conflict between
Vietnamese-backed soldiers and the Khmer Rouge. The long
history of guerrilla warfare in the province led to very
fluid land occupancy. In many districts, residents fled
their homes during periods of intense fighting and returned
once the fighting subsided. New migrants--often displaced
from their home provinces or looking for better economic
opportunities--also came to Battambang with the end of the
war. Governor Prach Chan noted that these migrants should
have asked for government permission to settle on new land,
but rarely did.


3. (SBU) Pol Sarith of the NGO Vigilance estimated that 90%
of the land disputes in Battambang involve the military and
that following the war, many military commanders claimed to
own the land their soldiers had "liberated". From 1996 until
about 2000, he explained, military officers were typically a
party to disputes. However, as they sold their disputed
holdings, the number of cases of villagers squaring off
against new "owners" has risen, and these now account for the
majority of cases. Sarith also noted that 40% of Vigilance's
current land dispute caseload involves cases in 11 villages
involving 12,000 people who have settled on environmentally
protected land without government permission. (Note: It is
common for different government bodies, as well as private
citizens, to have conflicting claims to the same land. End
note.) Indeed, Governor Prach Chan told Econoff that 2/3 of
the province is state-owned environmentally protected land,
leaving little available land for migrants or newlyweds
establishing new households.


4. (SBU) NGO observers estimated that about 10% of the
provincial population is involved in a land dispute and that
the number of land disputes appears to be rising. Yeng Meng
Ly of the NGO Adhoc noted that they had 13 land dispute cases
in all of 2005, but in January 2006 alone they received three
new cases. (Note: Most of Adhoc's cases involve hundreds of
people each. End Note.) Road development is causing a rapid
rise in land prices, which in turn is fueling land
speculation. Speculation is so rampant, Meng Ly noted, that
people from Phnom Penh buy land in Battambang from the
military without having seen the land or even knowing where
it is. Sarith noted that the affected villagers are becoming
increasingly angry each year. Some turn to NGOs for legal
help, he said, but others arm themselves with machetes,
hammers, or whatever they can find and prepare to forcibly
battle eviction.

Ompil Pram Dahm: Dispute Threatens Long-Settled Community
-------------- --------------


5. (SBU) The residents of Ompil Pram Dahm village, whose
name means "Five Mandarin Trees", lived on the same land for
generations. In 1994, fighting between the Khmer Rouge and
government-backed soldiers displaced the entire commune,
sending more than 1,000 families living in seven villages in

PHNOM PENH 00000365 002 OF 004


the commune to Bovel commune 12 kms away. The displaced
villagers lived in Bovel commune until 1997, when fighting
ended. However, when they tried to return to Ompil Pram
Dahm, the former Khmer Rouge soldiers settled in the area
said that they had liberated this area and now owned part of
the land where the village was located. Undeterred, the
original residents moved back to the area. However, the
soldiers sold 120 hectares of disputed land to 90 families
from Battambang and neighboring Banteay Meanchey provinces.
Some villagers lost all their land in these sales, while
others lost just a portion of their land or none at all. The
residents were unsure if the buyers bought this land in good
faith or knowingly bought disputed land; the villagers were
unaware of the sale price.


6. (SBU) In 2003, the villagers decided that they had had
enough and agreed to work together to plant rice in the
disputed areas. In November 2003, the Ministry of Land
Management issued a letter recognizing the right of the
original residents to grow rice on the disputed land.
Villagers planted rice, but when harvest time came, the
purported owners came and claimed the rice harvest.
Villagers' complaints to police and commune council had no
effect. In 2004, the military mediated an agreement between
the buyers and the villagers whereby 76 hectares of the 120
disputed hectares was divided evenly between original
residents and new buyers. However, 44 hectares, belonging to
34 families, are still in dispute.


7. (SBU) Residents say that because of the loss of their
land and the areas still in dispute, the village no longer
has sufficient land to feed itself. They must rent
agricultural fields in other areas and increase their incomes
by raising additional livestock and sending some villagers to
work as day laborers in Thailand. Moreover, a new generation
of landless villagers is being created as many families no
longer have land to give to newlyweds. In 1999 and in April
2005, villagers traveled to Phnom Penh to protest in front of
the National Assembly. They remain frustrated by the
remaining 44 disputed hectares but are unsure of what action
to take. They say that they will not resort to violence, as
they fear arrest.

"Heaven for the Rich, Hell for the Poor" in Banteay Meanchey
-------------- --------------


8. (U) For economic migrants after the Khmer Rouge period,
Banteay Meanchey province seemed like a dream come true: a
relatively sparsely populated province with fertile land and
a 180 km-long border with Thailand, allowing for easy access
to consumers and day labor jobs in Thailand. But according
to the governor of the province, General Heng Chantha,
Poipet, the province's largest town, is "heaven for the rich
and hell for the poor". Poipet has attracted many migrants
hoping for well-paying jobs at its casinos, but leaves most
struggling to survive on the low wages of day laborers and
merchants. More than 3,000 Cambodians cross into Thailand
each day to sell their wares at a market just across the
border, and an unknown number come to work as day laborers on
construction projects, agricultural fields, or shining shoes
on the streets of Poipet. Children working as porters
smuggle clothing and other goods into Thailand on foot, often
walking more than 20 km each day just to earn a dollar and a
half.


9. (U) As Poipet has quickly and dramatically transformed
from a dusty border crossing to a bustling town with six
casinos, land prices have risen dramatically and land
disputes have followed quickly behind. According to Khun
Borin of the Cambodian Association for Rural Development and
Health, land in Poipet commune that was mined and essentially
worthless in 1992, was worth about USD 20 per square meter in
2000 and USD 100 per square meter today. Prices for land all
along the Thai border and in the provincial capital,
Sisophon, have also increased dramatically in recent years.
Similarly, rising land prices are fueling land speculation,
but because wealthy investors don't take up residence on
their land, squatters move in.


10. (SBU) Unscrupulous individuals use different ploys to
take advantage of the demand for land. Gen. Chantha noted
that some unethical government officials sent to work in the
province hire people to move in to uninhabited land to create
a dispute that they can use to their advantage. Andy
Kervell, Technical Advisor to the provincial Mine Action
Planning Unit, told of several cases where desperately poor

PHNOM PENH 00000365 003 OF 004


people are told that they can have small plots of land if
they are willing to demine the land themselves, but when the
demining is finished, the land owner reneges on the deal.
Lee Huong of Adhoc noted that over the past few months, most
of their cases have involved villagers who are removed
reportedly because the land they occupy has been declared a
community forest, only to have the forest cleared by others
once these villagers leave.


11. (SBU) Borin estimated that 45% of the provincial
population is involved in a land dispute. Gen. Chantha noted
that in just one of the provinces' eight districts, there are
more than 100 active land disputes involving more than 5,000
people, and the number of land disputes across the province
are increasing each day. Nhem Sarath of Adhoc reported that
they have received 16 land dispute cases involving a total of
10,000 individuals since January 2005.

Prey Prik: Community May Use Violence to Defend Land
-------------- --------------


12. (U) From 1995 to 1999, a disparate group of
Cambodians--all of whom had been internally displaced or
living in refugee camps during the war--settled in Prey Prik
village, located in Poipet commune just 10 km from the casino
strip and 8 km from the Thai border. The village is situated
on a former minefield, and in fact some of the 815 families
who settled in Prey Prik did so before the area was formally
demined by the Cambodian Mine Action Center in 1997. During
the war, the area had been occupied by the Royal Cambodian
Armed Forces' 911th regional military battalion.


13. (C) In 1999, the battalion began building small roads in
and around the village (with the villagers' consent) and also
began to sell both occupied and unoccupied land to new
owners. Although other commune residents were listed as the
land owners, many say that in fact these people are merely
frontmen for a small group of powerful Cambodians. Borin
told Econoff that he saw documents listing Khun Kim (Deputy
Commander in Chief of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces),Nhem
Soeun (wife of CPP faction leader and Senate President Chea
Sim) and Hok Lundy (Commissioner General of the National
Police) as some of the purported owners of the land.


14. (SBU) The disputed land claims remained dormant until
2005 when Chun Samnang, one of the sellers, created a list of
purported land owners and turned it in to the commune
authorities. Samnang had also been appointed--rather than
elected--as a village representative, over the mounting
objections of some of the villagers. His list of land owners
reportedly included the names of the new buyers as well as
his friends and associates among the earlier settlers.
However, villagers who were out of favor with Samnang were
left off the list, regardless of their claim to the land.
589 families filed a complaint alleging that they were being
stripped of 103 hectares that was rightfully theirs.


15. (SBU) Initially, commune and national authorities
appeared to be sympathetic to the villagers' claims. On
August 7, 2005, the commune chief gave the villagers a
temporary land certificate, and on August 22, 2005, the
Council of Ministers issued a directive saying that the
disputed land belongs to the villagers and they have the
right to live there. However, just a week later, the Prime
Minister issued a circular asking the Minister of Land
Management to reconsider these decisions, and provincial
authorities quickly canceled the temporary land certificates.
Villagers now fear that they will be forcibly evicted, just
as their neighbors in Kbal Spien, only a few kilometers away,
were in a violent episode in March 2005 (Ref A).


16. (SBU) Prey Prik villagers have no agricultural land
other than small family gardens; they work as day laborers in
Thailand. Many villagers travel to Thailand daily to work as
shoe polishers and porters, earning about USD 1.50 per day
and paying about 40 cents to commute by motorcycle taxi. The
villagers want to gain permanent title to the land so they
can construct buildings, including a school. They are
determined to remain on their land, and told Econoff that
they will try to persuade government officials not to evict
them. However, if their attempts at persuasion are
unsuccessful, they said that they would consider resorting to
violence.

Comment
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PHNOM PENH 00000365 004 OF 004




17. (C) These two cases help illustrate some of the reasons
NGOs have had difficulty in addressing land disputes in a
systemic way (Ref B). The use of pseudonyms and frontmen
means that it is frequently difficult to ascertain who is
really involved in land disputes. Overlapping government
claims must be resolved. Cambodia's court system is
notoriously corrupt, and offers little hope for those who
cannot afford to buy a favorable decision. And in some
cases, the poor and vulnerable simply may not have legal
rights to the land they occupy.


18. (SBU) While it is almost invariably relatively poor
Cambodians being affected the most by land disputes, these
two cases also illustrate that different communities bring
vastly different economic, intellectual, and social resources
to bear in their conflict. Ompil Pram Dahm villagers have
long-standing community ties, have elected leadership, and
live in typical rural Cambodian conditions. Their village
chief keeps scrupulous notes about the land dispute, and the
villagers have some, although not sufficient, agricultural
land. In contrast, Prey Prik is a collection of villagers
displaced from their homes across the country who struggle to
survive and live in conditions that are difficult even by
rural Cambodian standards. They have no agricultural plots
of any size and their housing is made of plastic sheeting on
wooden frames. They have no elected village leader, and the
older villagers who speak for the group are illiterate. It
is no surprise that those who are the most desperate are the
ones more willing to use violence to defend their precarious
community.
Storella