“They [ADB] told us to create a joint savings group to help ourselves. Right now, we do not have enough money for food, so how can we save?”: How callous can the ADB be?

ADB petition response provokes villagers

Thursday, 19 April 2012
Khouth Sophak Chakrya and Cassandra Yeap
The Phnom Penh Post

The Asian Development Bank has responded to a petition filed by Phnom Penh evictees of the national railway rehabilitation project, a bank spokesperson said yesterday.

ADB operations coordinator Mao Ouk said the bank had raised the issues, which include infrastructure concerns and help with their livelihoods, with the Inter-ministerial Resettlement Committee and that the government was in the process of implementing an “expanded income restoration programme” that involved self-help groups and community credit schemes.

But villager representative Ros Bopha said that a letter received from the ADB on April 12 provided the “opposite” of what they were asking.

“They [ADB] told us to create a joint savings group to help ourselves,” she said. “Right now, we do not have enough money for food, so how can we save?”

Some 160 families were relocated from Russey Keo district to Por Senchey district’s Trapaing Anchang village on March 6.