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ket value of the land. Others forewent cash and accepted compensation housing at a relo-
cation site 25 kilometers from town, far from schools, jobs, and health care. Real estate
agents estimated that the 133-hectare lakeside site could be worth more than $1.3 billion
on the open market, and maybe twice that once developed. Shukaku paid just $79 million
for its lease.
Lakeside resident Tep Vanny, then 27, remembers receiving a letter from the authorities
informing people about the Shukaku lease and promising them they would not be affected
by the project. “But they cheated us,” Vanny told me later. “The municipal government
sold the land illegally to the private company without coming to negotiate with the vil-
lagers who live here.” Boeung Kak soon became a flashpoint for rising discontent about
urban land evictions. Residents from the lake, led by a hardy band of local women, took
their grievances to the street, staging noisy protests outside City Hall that often culmin-
ated in violent crackdowns by riot police. Later, they were joined by evictees from Borei
Keila and other urban communities.
In the forefront of the anti-eviction protesters was Vanny, a self-described housewife
with long black hair and intense dark-brown eyes. Vanny, born into a poor family in Kam-
pot, first settled at Boeung Kak with her husband in 2004. Four years later, when the
sand-pumping began, Vanny threw herself into the fight for the residents' land. She led
marches on City Hall and tussled with riot police. In mid-2011, as the activities of Vanny
and her fellow protestors began attracting international attention, Hun Sen announced that
12.44 hectares of the Boeung Kak development zone would be carved off for the remain-
ing families, but many claimed they were excluded and protests continued. At a peaceful
protest in May 2012 a mixed force of gendarmes, riot police, and district security guards
arrested 13 women, including a 72-year-old grandmother. For Vanny, catapulted from a
quiet home life to the frontlines of a struggle against arbitrary government power, her
month in custody was surreal. “I used to watch Chinese movies where people were treated
unjustly,” she said of her time in prison, “but I couldn't believe it was happening to me.”
The trial of the “Boeung Kak 13,” as they became known, took place two days after
their arrest. They faced charges of “cursing public authority” and encroaching on public
land. The women stood trial at 2 p.m.; by 5:30 they had each been sentenced to two and
a half years in jail. “They brought us to the court just for a legal procedure, but not for
justice,” Vanny said, her dark eyes flashing. “They court did not follow the law—they
just followed the authorities.” The city reacted to the international backlash by redoubling
its pressure on the protestors. It described Boeung Kak as “an insecure place, shelter for
criminals, gangsters, drug dealers, prostitutes and terrorists.”
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Under international pressure, the Boeung Kak 13 were released on appeal in June 2012,
but the protestors continued to face the threat of arrest. In September, a Boeung Kak
community leader by the name of Yorm Bopha was arrested and later sentenced to three
