Reactions on the Web to the Dey Krohom eviction range from emotion to rallying

Several websites have published articles, videos, pictures and songs to mobilise Internet users about the fate of the families evicted on Saturday 24th January from Dey Krohom, a neighbourhood in the capital of Cambodia.

30-01-2009
By Laurent Le Gouanvic
Ka-set in English

Cambodian police firing tear gas, an army of young workers demolishing frail houses with sledge hammers and axes, bulldozers crushing everything on their way at the risk of injuring tearful residents fleeing with the few possessions they have managed to save in the chaos... These images of the violent operation to evict the last residents of Dey Krohom, in Phnom Penh on Saturday 24th January, were not broadcast on CNN or any major international television network. Yet, for the last few days, they have been going round the world through the Internet and its new “social networking” tools, like Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Blogspot or Wordpress. Gradually, after the initial emotional reactions, outraged Internet users are trying – and somewhat struggling – to raise awareness about what happened with the widest possible audience, in Cambodia and abroad. One of their first actions is to launch an international appeal to draw mass protest against the Cambodian authorities and the 7NG company.

A message addressed directly to the authorities

“Dear Prime Minister Hun Sen, I am writing to express my shock at the violent eviction of the Dey Krahorm on January 24th, 2009 and to request that the evicted families receive adequate compensation for their losses.” So begins one of the two “sample letters” published on the website of the organisation "Bridges Across Borders" who invites Internet users throughout the world to copy and send these letters by email or fax to the head of the Cambodian government as well as the Minister of the Council of Ministers Sok An, the Chairman of the National Assembly Heng Samrin, the Governor of Phnom Penh Kep Chuktema, and the Chairman of the 7NG company Srey Sothea. The appeal is also relayed through emails and on a group page dedicated to land conflicts in Cambodia on the social networking website Facebook .

The page was created at the initiative of John Weeks, aka Jinja (or The Gecko in Khmer), an expat blogger in Cambodia who is very active in the Cambodian web circles and responsible for an important compilation of the different sources of information available on the Dey Krohom case . To this day, some 400 members have joined the Facebook group and publish statements, press articles, photos and videos on evictions in Cambodia. The messages posted on the Facebook page originate from Phnom Penh of course, but also from remote Colorado (United States), Canada, Ireland, Switzerland, Australia, Thailand, Hongkong, Philippines, India, or China... Some send a simple message to express their indignation, while others call for concrete actions, including donations of food or basic necessities.

Videos shot in the heart of the action

The group set up on this networking site also – and essentially – serves as a hub for all the written, photographic and audiovisual documents, which represent as much evidence on the eviction. It includes links to the multimedia slideshow and trilingual articles of... Ka-set , videos shot in the middle of the eviction, like the one co-produced by Platapus and Licadho Canada which was initially made available on-line on BlipTV and other “footage rushes” made public on the YouTube video broadcasting site or the human rights multimedia platform The Hub .

Also available on these websites, many archive documents, whether on the daily lives of the Dey Krohom residents , before their eviction, or on other cases of past or ongoing evictions, like at Boeung Kak lake.
“One eviction can hide another”

In parallel to the videos, photos taken during the eviction – but also before and afterwards – are also circulating on a large scale on the Web, whether on the sites of professional photographers (Peter Harris , John Vink ...), amateur ones (Chea Phal , a young Cambodian working for a Japanese NGO whose spends his free time taking pictures) or on photo-sharing sites like Flickr. A moderator on the Khmer Network forum invites people to hang these pictures on their walls to replace “useless” ones and comments “One eviction (forced displacement) can hide another... Watch this space.”

Also, voices are heard on blogs and echoed on the website Global Voices which offers a panorama and excerpts of bloggers' reactions.

Heated reactions

On her personal website, Jivy , a young Filipino living in Phnom Penh, breaks with her usual light messages on shopping and eating out. Still under the shock, she describes what she saw on the morning of Saturday 24th January. “Loud pounding noises woke me up this morning. (…) I looked out of my window and saw hundreds of men wearing green shirt, hammering the small houses in front of the building where my whole family live. It’s my first time to encounter scenes like this and it sent goosebumps all over me. There were lots of police men guarding the site and hundreds of spectators from their homes watched how their fellow Cambodians ruined other people’s houses in a small span of time. (…) I don’t know the whole story behind this horrifying scene, I don’t know if the land is under the government or under a private individual. All I know is that there are people out in the street this morning asking for some more time to discuss this matter before proceeding with the demolition. But people with no hearts didn’t listen.”

Other bloggers also share what they saw, comment on articles or, like Steve, Wendy, Isaac and Niam , the four members of an evangelist family working in Cambodia, express their anger and call to pray for the evicted residents of Dey Krohom.

Weak reaction among Khmer bloggers

However, one cannot but notice that only a few Cambodian bloggers (or Cloggers) express themselves on the eviction. Most of them, including those used to starting heated debates, are strangely silent on the Chinese New Year eve. Similarly, the issue hardly inflames discussion forums of Cambodians living in France. On Khmer Network, while a message on “paedophiles in Cambodia” has generated over a hundred responses and been read more than 3,000 times since 18 January, the one about Dey Krohom has only been commented on seven times and read by about a hundred visitors... Hence the reaction of BAC, one of the few people who reacted, “It [Dey Krohom] is a cause for concern. Why? Well, because it is not a topic for discussion or blathering. It is such a cause for worry that the government is not saying anything. And even people on this forum remain silent. When something is too troubling, people have little of interest to say. It is more fun to blabber.”
--------------
"Do Not Agree"

Discover on the website SendSpace "Do Not Agree ", a song written a few days before their eviction by one of the Dey Krohom community representatives, Chan Vichet, and performed among and with other residents. An English translation of the Khmer lyrics is also available on the same website in a PDF file.

Also see the Bassac project of Khmer-American rapper PraCh, which part of his blog Mujestic.com is devoted to.