Day: July 22, 2023

Eighteen political parties will compete in Cambodia’s parliamentary election on July 23 – the country’s seventh national vote since the United Nations organized and ran the 1993 election two years after the Paris Peace Agreements.

The National Election Committee in May ruled that two parties – the main opposition Candlelight Party and the Khmer United Great Nation Party – could not appear on the ballot, citing inadequate paperwork.

The Candlelight Party is widely believed to be the only party that could have mounted a serious challenge to Prime Minister Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party, but its exclusion means the ruling CPP is expected to win the large majority – and possibly all – of the National Assembly’s 125 seats.

Even if it doesn’t, most of the other parties are deferential to the CPP and Hun Sen. Many officials from the smaller parties have been appointed to the Supreme Consultative Council, an advisory body created by Hun Sen following the 2018 election to bolster his power with the appearance of multi-party support.

Here’s a look at every party on the ballot.

_ Beehive Social Democratic Party: Radio station owner Mam Sonando founded the party in 2016. He had been a vocal critic of Hun Sen’s government, and his independent Beehive Radio station was once described by Human Rights Watch as “a key platform for promotion of human rights and democracy.”

But after the 2018 election, the prime minister appointed Mam Sonando to the Supreme Consultative Council. Since then, the Beehive Party has repeatedly come out in support of the government.

_ Cambodia Indigenous Peoples Democracy Party: The party was formed in early 2017 and is headquartered in Mondulkiri province. The president is Blang Sin, an ethnic Pnong who has participated in the Supreme Consultative Council. The party has not had an active campaign presence.

_ Cambodian Nationality Party: Chaired by Seng Sokheng and first registered as a party with the Ministry of Interior in 2011, the party supports Hun Sen’s leadership and attacks opposition activists. It also participates in the Supreme Consultative Council, a body Hun Sen created.

_ Cambodian People’s Party: Originally known as the Kampuchean People’s Revolutionary Party, it was formed in 1951 as part of Ho Chi Minh’s Indochina Communist Party. 

Hun Sen is its president and has been in power in government since 1985. The party has listed his eldest son, Hun Manet, as a National Assembly candidate in Phnom Penh. Hun Sen has said that he wants Hun Manet to eventually succeed him as prime minister – a transition that could happen soon after the election. 

_ Cambodian Youth Party: The party was founded in 2015 by Pich Sros, a former garment worker. Along with Funcinpec, it filed a complaint in 2017 against the Cambodia National Rescue Party – then the country’s main opposition party – that led to that party’s dissolution. After the 2018 general election, Pich Sros was promoted to the rank of senior minister when he agreed to participate in the Supreme Consultative Council. He has been active in criticizing the opposition.

_ Democracy Power Party: Formed in 2020 by Un Visethkun, the former vice president of the Cambodian Youth Party. The party praised and supported Hun Sen’s policies. In February, the party issued a statement supporting the government’s decision to revoke the license of independent media outlet Voice of Democracy. 

_ Dharmacracy Party: Formed in 1998, party officials did not take any action until 2017. After the CNRP was dissolved, the party participated in the 2018 general election. Its president, Por Tey Savathy, and her husband, vice president Tan Chanphal, have been appointed to the Supreme Consultative Council. The party follows Hun Sen’s political line.

_ Ekpheap Cheat Khmer Party: The party announced in 2022 that it had expelled president Un Chim – a former Buddhist monk from California – following accusations that he faked a voice message from Hun Sen. The acting president of the party, Lak Sopheap, told reporters in January 2022 that the fake message was sent to party members in Cambodia and the U.S. as a way of attacking her and other party leaders. The contents of the message has not been revealed to reporters.

_ Farmer’s Party: Established in 1988. The president is Meas Bo Pov, a former CPP member who has been connected to a number of public land disputes. The party follows Hun Sen’s political line. In May, it published a statement supporting the NEC’s decision to disallow the Candlelight Party from the election. 

_ Funcinpec: Formed in March 1981 as a resistance movement to the Vietnam-backed regime of the 1980s. It signed the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements and formed a coalition government with the CPP after the 1993 election. 

Internal conflicts and Hun Sen’s separatist strategy have weakened the party over the years. Nhek Bun Chhay of the Khmer National United Party was the party’s secretary-general from 2006-2015.

The current president is Prince Norodom Chakravuth, the grandson of the late King Norodom Sihanouk and the eldest son of the late Prince Norodom Ranariddh, who served as co-prime minister from 1993-1997. Most voters no longer associate Funcinpec with the country’s royalist past, especially after Ranariddh’s decisions at various times over the years to align with the CPP.

_ Grassroots Democratic Party: Formed in 2015 by a group of senior intellectuals, leaders and members of civil society. It’s led by Yeng Virak, former president of the Community Legal Education Center, a Phnom Penh NGO that works on land issues. 

While some senior party officials have recently left to join the government, the party continues to criticize alleged violations of law and human rights committed by Hun Sen’s government, including the recent passage of an election law amendment that prohibits those who don’t vote in this month’s elections from running for office in the future. 

_ Khmer Anti-Poverty Party: Led by Kravanh Daron, a Cambodian-American who worked as a social worker in the United States for 25 years. The party was registered by the Ministry of Interior in 2007. It declared non-recognition of the 2018 election results, citing the Supreme Court’s ban on the main opposition party at the time, the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP).

Khmer Anti-Poverty Party officials have not participated in the Supreme Consultative Council. But last year, the Khmer Overseas Facebook page leaked several photos of Kravanh Daron posing with Hun Sen and Hun Manet. It’s unclear how close Kravanh Daron is with the prime minister and his son.

_ Khmer Conservative Party: The party was registered with the Ministry of Interior in 2019.

It is led by former CNRP lawmaker Riel Khemrin.

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_ Khmer Economic Development Party: Headed by Huon Chanthon. Party officials have joined the Supreme Consultative Council and have issued a series of statements in support of Hun Sen’s policies. Last month, the party released a congratulatory letter to the CPP on the anniversary of its founding.

_ Khmer National United Party: Formed in 2016, its president is Nhek Bun Chhay, a prominent Cambodian political figure and a former senior Funcinpec official. The party did not win a seat in the 2018 election, but Nhek Bun Chhay was given the same rank as a senior minister by participating on the Supreme Consultative Council. 

At the end of 2022, the Kampuchea Niyum Party, run by former CNRP lawmaker Yem Ponharith, announced its intention to join the Khmer United National Party for the 2023 election. 

_ Khmer United Party:  Established in 2018 by Kem Rithisit, the younger brother of Kem Ley, a political commentator and social activist who was gunned down in Phnom Penh in 2016. Kem Rithisit joined the Supreme Consultative Council after the 2018 election. He resigned as party president at the end of 2020 but remains with the party as an honorary president. The Khmer United Party follows Hun Sen’s political line.

_ People Purpose Party: Led by Ith Sarm, a former vice president of the League for Democracy Party (LDP), which won a few seats in the 2012 commune election and also participated in the 2013 general election but is not participating in this election.

The LDP didn’t contest the 2022 commune elections, citing threats against its members and a disagreement with the NEC over how votes are validated at polling stations. The party has not explained why it’s not contesting this year’s election.

Ith Sarm is active on Facebook, where he discusses social and political issues as well as broadcast news programs. But since its inception in 2019, the People Purpose Party has done little to no work at building a grassroots presence. 

_ Women for Women Party: Established in 2019. The party’s president is Soeung Sothy, a businesswoman in the tourism industry. It has only until recently become politically active.

Radio Free Asia spoke with former Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans on Wednesday, ahead of Sunday’s parliamentary election in Cambodia. 

Evans is the architect of the 1991 Paris Peace Accord, which ended war in Cambodia and promised democratic freedoms and human rights. It led to the 1993 U.N.-sponsored election that was contested by multiple political parties.  

Thirty years later, Prime Minister Hun Sen’s relentless campaign to co-opt dissenting voices and effectively ban the main opposition Candlelight Party from participating in this year’s vote has been a “shameless, disgraceful, indefensible” development, Evans said.

The response from the international community should lie in applying serious, systematic targeted sanctions against current Cambodian leaders and ruling elites, he said. As for opposition activists, Evans suggests to “keep the flame alive and wait for the times and circumstances to change.”

RFA: Cambodia will have an election next Sunday. And as you know, just a few weeks before the election, Hun Sen amended the election law banning those who fail to cast their ballot from running for office in the future. We want to hear your view on that.

Gareth Evans: Well, obviously, the recent electoral law changes are shameless, disgraceful, indefensible. It’s obviously designed to avoid any opportunity for a boycott. Not that boycotts have been very successful in the past, but it’s entirely consistent with the increasingly autocratic character of the Hun Sen regime.

We’ve seen this. We’ve seen this play out so many times before in so many different ways. This is just the latest version of it, a complete crackdown on anything resembling decency, anything resembling decent democracy. It’s a very, very unhappy development, but something that I’m afraid we’ve become used to.

RFA: Even though there are 18 political parties contesting the election, the main, credible opposition party, the Candlelight Party, has been banned by the National Election Committee, saying that it had failed to provide an original registration document. But as you know, this is an attempt from Prime Minister Hun Sen’s party, the CPP, to eliminate any possible opposition party in the election.

Gareth Evans: Yes, we’ve seen this play before with the banning of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (in 2017). We’ve seen it with the criminal proceedings against Sam Rainsy. We’ve seen it with the criminal proceedings against Kem Sokha, and we’ve seen it now, of course, with the banning of the Candlelight Party. 

So, although notionally we have, as you say, a lot of small parties still contesting the election, the reality is that the only serious opposition to the CPP was the major parties of the major players, the major spokesmen, and they have been completely suppressed now by these measures. 

Again, I say with the rest of the world, this is shameless. This is disgraceful. This is indefensible. And it’s just a fundamental assault on democracy. And I can’t understand anyone who cannot be very, very unhappy about that, particularly given the whole history of Cambodia and the efforts that we went to at the time of the peace settlement, the Paris Peace Accords, to entrench democracy and human rights in the Cambodian constitution and the Cambodian system. So it’s unfortunately been a very unhappy story ever since.

RFA: Even though this is an unhappy story, Hun Sen survives all the time. He lost the 1993 election. He managed to hold onto power as the second prime minister, and then he conducted a coup (in 1997) and chased out the first prime minister. 

As you know, five years ago he banned the CNRP from contesting the election. He won that election. The whole world refused to accept the election result as soon as the result was announced. But then the world has to work with him. Is it enough for the international community just to not accept the result of this sham election?

Gareth Evans: No. I think the international community has to do more. In fact, when I think back on it, I mean, the real trouble started back in 1993 with that first election result, which was a demonstration of how much the Cambodian people really wanted democracy, really wanted to have a say in how they governed. 

But of course, Hun Sen refused to accept the election result then. We went along with his objections and allowed him to become the second prime minister. And the rest is history. So we’ve performed very badly as an international community all these years. 

And I think the solution is not in the multilateral organizations. I mean, people talk about reconvening the Paris International Conference and somehow, you know, getting the terms of the agreement re-enforced. But the most that could happen if that were to take place, would be simply to refer the issue back to the competent UN organs, back to the Human Rights Council. So we would just go around and around in circles, as you say, making occasional statements, occasional resolutions of international bodies, but nothing really happening.

So, I think the solution lies essentially with individual countries, not so much the multilateral intergovernmental organizations, not the UN itself, not the Human Rights Council. I think it depends on individual countries applying quite serious sanctions.

RFA: What would be your advice to opposition leaders and to the Cambodian people in general? How much longer can they continue to fight? And what would be your advice so that the effort can be sustainable?

Gareth Evans: Well, of course, that’s the situation at the moment. It’s very bleak, It’s very desolate and it’s very dangerous for opponents of the regime internally. And it’s difficult for me sitting comfortably in Australia to be telling, you know, people who are unhappy with the situation in Cambodia what to do. 

But all I can say is you just have to keep that flame alive. You have to keep that flame burning and wait for the times and circumstances to change. I don’t believe there is anything in the Cambodian water that is hostile to democracy, that’s in favor of authoritarianism, that’s in favor of paternalism. 

I saw for myself in 1993 how badly how badly the people of Cambodia wanted a say in their own government, wanted a return to normality and decency. That spirit is there, and it just has to be quietly nurtured, supported by overseas countries like Australia and the United States, helping at the margins. 

Optimism is self-reinforcing. Pessimism is very self-defeating. And unless you believe the change can happen and will happen over time, then the change is never going to happen. You just have to go on believing in it and staying committed. And I know there are a great many decent Cambodians doing just that at the moment, and I wish them every possible success.

Myanmar’s opposition National Unity Government held a soft launch Saturday of the Spring Development Bank, an online bank service and an important means to circumvent the military-controlled banking sector and raise funds to support the resistance to the junta.

The Spring Development Bank will face many hurdles in the war-torn country, including hacking and other attacks from the military regime, but the tech-savvy institution will also lay the groundwork for Myanmar’s future financial system. 

Myanmar’s banking system grew considerably before the coup, but the sector was awash in non-performing loans. While many new banks emerged, many were tied to regime cronies and not professionally managed. There was a huge need for bank consolidation and recapitalization. 

The exception to this was in the mobile banking sector, which took off and became indispensable for small businesses and farmers. There are seven different mobile payment systems, though two, Wave Money and KBZ Pay, dominate the market. 

Immediately after the Feb. 1, 2021 coup, the junta briefly shut down mobile platforms because they were being used to channel donations to the civil disobedience movement, known as the Spring Revolution., and later to the opposition National Unity Government (NUG). 

But they were too important to the economy, and the regime allowed them to reopen, though with considerable oversight and monetary limits on transactions. The regime has worked to tie mobile accounts to registered SIM cards, closed tens of thousands of anonymous accounts, and increased personal information requirements. The junta has deployed uniformed military personnel to all banks to monitor any transaction over $40. 

The junta’s control over the mobile banking system in particular curtailed the Spring Lottery, the NUG’s first attempt to raise revenue. Not only was the Spring Lottery meant to raise a steady amount of funds on a monthly basis, it sought to deny the regime revenue from their own lottery. 

The real challenge: moving Funds 

The NUG has acknowledged raising over $150 million since the coup. It has rejected any involvement in illicit narcotics, despite the fact that they are pouring out of the country in record amounts. 

Though it dwarfs in comparison to the revenue of the junta, which gave itself a raise of 51 percent in FY2023 to $2.7 billion – it’s not insignificant either. 

The NUG has raised funds through the auction of military owned property and land preemptively seized under eminent domain, crypto bond sales, mining rights, and potentially shares in military-owned corporations. All of this possible through their FINTECH savvy.

These are a leap of faith for any purchaser or investor. The bonds are zero coupon and will only be redeemed if the opposition wins. The property and corporate shares are theoretical: No construction or land transfer happens should the NUG fail to defeat the junta. But people are fueled by patriotism and a vitriolic hatred of the military. 

For the NUG, the harder task is moving raised funds through crypto currencies and turning it into usable resources to buy weapons and ammunition. The crypto bonds are issued in the Czech Republic, but the Prague government limits the NUG’s access to the banking system.

Aside from the military’s control over the banks, moving funds is not easy due to the post-9/11 international banking environment and the October 2022 Financial Action Task Force blacklisting that increases oversight on financial transactions in and out of Myanmar. 

In mid-2022, the NUG established a mobile wallet system, NUGPay, to try to circumvent the formal banking system. The app had mixed results. It required a network of licensed brokers, around the country and world, who could take foreign exchange or Kyat and turn it into the digital Myanmar Kyat (DMMK) tied to Tether, a U.S. dollar-denominated stablecoin.

While it made donations from overseas easier, widespread internet outages and the physical danger for licensed agents in Myanmar limited its use as a currency. Even being caught with the NUGPay app on one’s phone can lead to a prison sentence. 

Despite the limitations, over $30 million in DMMK are currently in circulation. 

Full-service online banking

To overcome the shortcomings of NUGPay, the NUG’s Ministry of Planning, Finance and Investment developed a full-service online bank that will open in several phases, starting in August.

The bank is legally registered in a third country (unnamed for security reasons) and is under the oversight of the NUG’s interim Central Bank, which was established in June 2023. 

The Spring Development Bank (SDB) will provide for-profit banking services that include savings accounts, gold purchases, remittances, a long-term investment fund, and foreign currency exchange.

It is accepting deposits in U.S. dollars, Singapore dollars, Thai baht and Myanmar kyat. It will expand its currency offerings to the Euro,  pound, Japanese yen, and Korean won in the future.

In its second phase, it will issue its own coin for investors and provide credit cards and a merchant payment system.

As important, SDB will also serve as a one stop outlet for the purchase of bonds, lottery tickets, auctioned real estate, and in the future, shares in military-owned corporations. Thus it is a way for the NUG to raise funds in a regular and streamlined fashion, with proceeds going directly into NUG accounts.

 

SDB has already received the attention of the military government.

In June 2023, a Vietnamese IT company established a mirror site to the Spring Development Bank, using the same graphics and interface, an apparent phishing expedition to get the names and contact information of people trying to sign up, in order to arrest them and deter others.

Hacking and disruption

The NUG is expecting a concerted effort by the military government to hack into the bank and disrupt NUG finances. The bank is based on block-chain technology on the Polygon Network.

SDB has a number of other hurdles, including getting widespread use when the military continues to shut down the internet in large swaths of the country. The goal is to have 100,000 customers within the first six months, and 500,000 within a year.

The bank will have an important role for the provision of government functions. Union ministries will have accounts and be able to fund their operations at both the federal and local level; it will assist in tax collection, now being done in 32 of 330 townships. 

Most importantly, it will allow foreign donors, whether governments, NGOs, or multilateral economic institutions directly support the NUG’s civil administration and provision of humanitarian aid.

With the motto “Real Bank. Real Freedom,” the Spring Development Bank, is yet another tech savvy innovation from the National Unity Government that is laying the financial foundations for a protracted war.

But it’s also laying the groundwork for the country’s future financial system. Myanmar-Now  reported that with a diminished tax and revenue base, the military government has been forcing both state-owned and private banks and insurance companies to purchase bonds to fund the war effort, to the tune of up to $8 billion since the coup.

That is a staggering figure, even if it’s less than reported. According to the World Bank, Myanmar’s GDP was $59.3 billion in 2022, 12 percent below the pre-coup figure.

The junta has used its Central Bank as a piggy bank to support the war, not as an independent body to provide macroeconomic stability. It seems unlikely that the regime will ever fully redeem the bonds when they mature, leaving already distressed banks even further indebted. 

What should be assets on their balance sheets are nothing but liabilities, and the NUG has made clear that these issuances are illegal and will not be honored.

That might make the Spring Development Bank, not just essential for the establishment of a federal democracy, it might also make it the most solvent bank in the country.

Zachary Abuza is a professor at the National War College in Washington and an adjunct at Georgetown University. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the position of the U.S. Department of Defense, the National War College, Georgetown University or Radio Free Asia.