Clad in orange, with a shaved head, and barefoot, she could have passed for Buddhist nun. But Cambodian-American lawyer Seng Chan Theary also had shackles on her ankles and, for the authorities, she was walking way too close to the prime minister’s residence in Phnom Penh.
Theary wound up being whisked away and detained briefly by security forces. But she eventually made it to her real destination that morning, just four days into 2022: the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, where there is a case lodged against her for allegedly conspiring to commit treason and inciting to commit a felony.
The charges stem from Theary’s alleged involvement with the failed attempt of self-exiled opposition leader Sam Rainsy to return to Cambodia in late 2019. Theary, however, is not the only one facing such charges, which could mean a maximum jail term of 12 years.
In November 2020, more than 130 members and supporters — real and perceived — of the dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) found themselves being called to court, many of them to face charges similar to Theary’s. Only about 30 or so managed to show up for the formal reading of charges against them, but the courtroom was nevertheless packed, which rendered the COVID-19 protocol of “social distancing” impossible to implement. Most of the defendants were also confused why they were there; even those who admitted to having once been part of the CNRP were puzzled since the party had been forcibly disbanded by authorities three years earlier.
Opposition leader Sam Rainsy speaking to the press as he arrived in Malaysia in November 2019 for a self-imposed exile. He was tried and sentenced in absentia in March 2021 for allegedly trying to overthrow the Cambodian government.
For her part, Theary has since repeatedly said that she has no political affiliation; she has also said that she supports the “opposition party in line with my will regarding reconciliation and peace.” She was and is known to be a rights advocate, and had even founded two civil society organizations (CSOs) sometime after she decided to settle in Cambodia, her country of birth, in 2007. Still, in an interview conducted a year after she was first summoned to court, Theary said that she had been surprised by the charges. Neither she nor her organizations had been active, she said, “because of the overall repressive environment here in Cambodia.”
Multiplying laws and diminishing aid
In fact, the government led by Prime Minister Hun Sen had begun tightening the screws on CSOs and the likes of Theary long before it thought of holding a mass trial for its perceived critics. The main trigger was the crushing defeat of Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) at the 2013 polls by the CNRP headed by Sam Rainsy. Out of the 123 legislative seats, CPP won only 66, down from the 90 it had clinched in the previous election; it also garnered only 48 percent of the total votes.
Soon after, things began to go wrong not only for the CNRP and its supporters but also for the CSOs. Just like many members of the political opposition, rights advocates have since been thrown in jail, chased out of the country, or ended up dead. These days, Cambodia’s civil society is fragmented, even as it continues to shrink.
Apparently, for the Cambodian authorities, the political opposition and the CSOs are pretty much the same thing. This is because the advocacies of the CSOs — among them, effective, efficient, and transparent government services, along with human rights — seem to echo the messages of the CNRP. Moreover, civil society actors, including the media, trade unions, and non-profit organizations, had been very successful in engaging the youth and much of the rest of the populace, as well as with putting the spotlight on issues such as the freedom of speech and expression. The government has been accused of suppressing these rights.
Shortly after the CPP’s dismal performance at the 2013 polls, the Hun Sen government started to deploy heavy-handed political and legal interventions to dilute the political opposition and civil society. In 2015, for instance, CPP lawmakers passed the Law on Associations and NGOs (LANGO) in the midst of a parliamentary boycott by their CNRP colleagues. LANGO has since become a surveillance tool used by the state on CSOs, as it requires exhaustive procedures on registration, funding approval, and reports, even as it imposes a slew of restrictions on the groups.
In 2017, the Supreme Court dissolved the CNRP on the charge of attempting to overthrow the government through a color revolution.
In February 2021, the Hun Sen government adopted the Sub-Decree on the Establishment of the National Internet Gateway; it will come into effect this February. According to Human Rights Watch, the law will “enable the government to increase online surveillance, censorship, and control of the Internet that will seriously infringe on rights to free expression and privacy.”
In March 2021, Cambodian authorities came up with the Law on Measures to Prevent the Spread of COVID-19 and Other Serious Contagious Diseases, which, among other things, imposes a maximum 20-year prison sentence for those violating it. The next month, a state emergency law was passed, which Amnesty International said provided the government “with a range of arbitrary and excessive powers in times of emergency.”
In the meantime, foreign aid from Western countries as well as Japan was on a steady decline, a trend that had been going on in the last several years. In part, this was because some of the donor countries, particularly those in Europe, had themselves run into economic challenges and other internal problems. Many countries had also decided to divert their funds to other nations such as Nepal and Myanmar, as well as to Africa, after Cambodia was upgraded to lower-middle-income status by the World Bank in mid-2016.
Then there was Sweden, which announced a stop to bilateral aid to Cambodia in June 2021, and then closed its embassy in Phnom Penh at year-end. In the statement regarding the bilateral aid halt, Swedish International Development Cooperation Minister Peter Eriksson said, “The democratic space in Cambodia has been severely restricted in recent years. This has made it difficult to pursue broad and close cooperation.”
He added, “The Government has therefore chosen to redirect our development efforts to offer better support for change with regard to human rights, democracy, and the rule of law in the country.”
China, by comparison, has been pouring more and more money into Cambodia. In June 2016, the Cambodian Council of Ministers even established the Civil Society Alliance Forum (CSAF), primarily to receive funding from China and then distribute the monies to Cambodian NGOs. Already one of Cambodia’s biggest donors before 2016, China is now the country’s number one donor and investor. This has prompted Hun Sen to declare, “If I don’t rely on China, who will I rely on?”
Shifting gears and direction
All these developments have had impacts on Cambodia’s CSOs. With both democratic space and their budgets shrinking — and the authorities breathing down their necks — CSOs affiliated or identified with Western governments and foundations have shifted from projects and activities focused on rights, anti-corruption, and democratic governance to less politically charged initiatives such as livelihood workshops. One international organization that used to run programs on youth political education and seminars on the rule of law now concentrates on initiatives on climate change, waste management, and the digital economy. Another CSO that had similar politically focused objectives now works on health and rural development.
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen (center) and his government have been tightening the screws on civil society organizations. The authorities do not seem to distinguish such groups from the political opposition.
Comments a rights advocate: “Five years after the murder of Kem Ley, many have chosen to stop their advocacy completely, go into exile, or become more ‘strategic’.” Kem Ley — an activist, researcher, and political commentator — was assassinated in July 2016.
Interestingly, while many CSOs often issue joint statements against repressive, discriminative, or unjust measures by local authorities or government agencies, the CSAF in a 2019 meeting with government officials said that local authorities have not restricted any of their members’ activities. Then again, CSAF members make it clear to everyone that they are allied with the government, often even repeating the statements of Prime Minister Hun Sen, as well as thanking him for his “devotion” to the country.
Some observers, however, note that while the initiatives of CSAF member organizations remain donor-driven or merely follow the directives of either China or the government, many of the non-CSAF groups are now holding more informal meetings with local influencers and community leaders to discuss project ideas and strategies.
This is seen by the observers as a positive development, as the ideas on how to move forward are no longer coming from the donors but from the beneficiaries themselves. Indeed, while the non-CSAF organizations have been credited for playing a significant part in post-1993 Cambodia’s civic and infrastructure development, their donor-dictated directions had made not a few observers uncomfortable, with some likening these to a new type of colonialism.
The brainstorming sessions that the non-CSAF groups are now holding in the grassroots are therefore seen as more than welcome. For the more optimistic, the grassroots meetings open these CSOs to initiatives that would resonate more with the local people, especially the youth. Two-thirds of Cambodia’s 16.72 million people are under the age of 30.
It remains to be seen, however, whether their new strategies would enable the non-CSAF organizations to keep working in Cambodia. After all, the legal minefield that is LANGO requires each of them to sign a Memorandum of Understanding that has to be renewed every three years, “depending on the projects of the foreign association or non-governmental organization.”
And as the experience of Seng Chan Theary so far shows, a state-critic mark can last quite long and can complicate one’s life.
The hearings on the charges against the 51-year-old are being held separately from those of the other defendants, who are being tried in groups. Calling the mass trial “political theater,” Theary showed up for one of her hearings last year as a “wounded” Khmer apsara dancer representing “the Cambodian population suffering under this autocratic regime.”
That was also the first time she had her head shaved. According to Theary, she did so to mourn the killing of CNRP activist Sin Khon, who had been stabbed to death two weeks prior, as well as to “mourn for those who have fled this dictatorship.” ●
Ou Ritthy is a team leader of Sour Mouy, a youth consulting and mentoring platform based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
