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| Signs in Thai (L) and Mandarin adorn a street in Poipet. Photograph supplied |
06 February 2013
By Kim Sarom
The Phnom Penh Post
A casino in the gambling hub of Poipet was told on Monday to remove celebratory Chinese New Year banners – strung across an adjacent public road – because they were written in Thai and Mandarin rather than Khmer.
Poipet town governor Ngor Meng Chroun ordered that the owners of the Star Vegas Casino remove the banners, which failed, he said, to appropriately celebrate Cambodian national identity.
Owners of the casino had removed the offending banners on February 4 after officials spoke with them, the governor added.
Banteay Meanchey provincial spokesman Uk Keo Ratanak said the banners should have been written in all three languages – Khmer, Mandarin and Thai – but Khmer should have been featured most prominently.
“If they are foreigners living in Cambodia, they should respect Cambodian laws,” he said. “They should write in large Khmer letters above and then in foreign languages below.”
Though fairly common across the country, it is technically illegal for Cambodian citizens to gamble in the Kingdom’s casinos.
A casino department manager, who asked not to be named, noted that the owners of the Star Vegas Casino are Thai, as are many of the establishment’s customers, which likely motivated the choice of languages.
Sy Saroun, chief of the provincial culture department, said that any signage adorning the province’s public spaces in the future must be written in Khmer – if not, authorities will demand it be taken down.
Star Vegas Casino’s owners could not be contacted yesterday.
8 comments:
This land belong to Thai and China now? Please all Khmer see this?
As Khmer I support an idea of MR Uk Keo Ratanak and MR Sy Saroun 100%. We all must protect our indentity, please not allow those businesses destroy our indentity.
Remove the non-khmer language shit out of Cambodia!
"but Khmer should have been featured most prominently", I am 1000/100% agree with you Mr. Uk Keo Ratanak. This land belongs to khmer so khmer language should be bigger than other language whether these casinos want to do a promotion during chinese new year. How about other products such as beer can, bottle of pure water and so on. do the owners of them follow the Cambodian rules? How about authorities concerned do they observe these strange logos and language written on those products?
Where the fuck the Chens and Thai think this is? Macao or Their land? Fucken ugly characters . FUcken Hun Sen for allowing this to happen. Fuck you all CPP , Chen and Youn dogs.
Congratulation to the Poipet town governor Ngor Meng Chroun
Khmer? what's that?
That is what's happening under Hun Sen's leadership. When the Vietnamese delegation visited Cambodia, Hun Sen ordered that Khmer lettering be written below the Vietnamese characters instead. So this shows how unimportant Khmer language is. Now it the same logic as well. If the Khmer language is low as displayed by Hun Sen, then there is no need for it to be displayed in the public places.
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