The Scramble for Cambodia - Hun Sen's Cambodia - page 170

mother recalled, “and then she couldn't speak anymore.” Chantha was rushed to hospital,
but died on the way. A few days later she was buried in a lonely spot on the family's farm,
under a roof of red corrugated iron, where a rusty tin of old joss-sticks was now lodged
in the dirt near a row of flowers.
For farming families like Chantha's, peace was supposed to be a blessing—a respite
from years of violence and political chaos. Instead the end of Cambodia's civil war
brought a new wave of social dislocation. Just as Hunsenomics has transformed life in
the cities, it has fundamentally altered age-old patterns of rural life. Like the Scramble
for Africa, the subdivision of the continent by European colonial powers in the late nine-
teenth century, Cambodia's land, forests, and natural resources have been parceled out
and sold to the highest and best-connected bidders. Rivers have been dammed, forests
have been felled, and millions of hectares have been leased in mining and economic land
concessions, the latter mostly for plantations of crops such as rubber, sugar, and cassava.
Since 2000, the resulting land disputes have affected more than 700,000 people, some-
times escalating into violent confrontations with the authorities. 1
Heng Chantha was the latest in a long line of victims. A month before her death the
prominent environmentalist Chut Wutty was shot and killed during an altercation with
military police in the Cardamom Mountains, where he had dedicated his life to fighting
illegal loggers. Before that, security guards employed by the agro-firm TTY opened fire
on villagers trying to prevent the clearing of cassava fields in Snuol district, not far from
Broma. Five protestors were injured, one critically. 2 During the Broma raid, the military
evicted hundreds of families in an operation the rights group LICADHO later described
as “a textbook case of excessive force.” 3
The government immediately dismissed Chantha's killing as an unfortunate accident
and ignored calls to investigate. Then they went further, accusing the Broma residents of
plotting to “secede” from the nation. Provincial governor Sar Chamrong told the media
that villagers had armed themselves with “axes, knives, hoes, crossbows, and arrows”
in an attempt to form some kind of breakaway state. This ludicrous allegation quickly
sprouted branches. The authorities launched a manhunt for suspected “secessionists”; po-
lice arrested Mam Sonando, one of Cambodia's few independent radio broadcasters, an
old foe of Hun Sen whose advocacy group, the Democrats Association, had strong sup-
port in Broma. In October he was sentenced to 20 years jail for masterminding the “plot.”
(He was freed five months later.) After the eviction soldiers were stationed in Broma to
secure the area and keep an eye on the remaining residents.
Chantha's parents never lodged a complaint about her death. There wasn't much point.
“I'm not sure which soldier shot her,” her mother said during my visit to Broma in late
2012. “So I begged them to give some money so my family could hold a funeral cere-
mony.” The governor gave the family $2,000 in compensation, but the cash didn't last