Of Rainsy, Suu Kyi, Gandhi and Rat Tunnels [but not necessarily in that order!]

Gandhi - not everyone is receptive to his philosophy of ahimsa or non-violence in civil protest, but his self-honesty, public spirited commitment, personal moral example and austere life style are beyond reproach. On one occasion, on his way home from his audience with the King of England, he was teased by on-lookers who asked him if he was sufficiently clothed to keep himself warm in the cold English winter and whether he was properly attired when attending the royal palace in his loincloth. Gandhi quickly replied: "Actually, the King dressed enough for the both of us!"  - School of Vice

Rainsy’s return

One tries not to focus on personal or private aspects of a public figure, yet sometimes as mentioned in this note below, the two spheres become overlapped and complicated owing to the nature of life in any public arena of importance. Mr Rainsy's recent decision to return from his four years of enforced exile was perhaps a result of the combination of a sense of public duty and practical calculations as much as it may have been of his inner intuition as a politician with a 'war' to win and battles to organise in that war. At sixty-four years he is not young, but not yet too old for his calling, while the adversities he has had to overcome within the last twenty plus years of his life have added invaluable mileage to his experience of politics without - to all appearance and purposes - either diluting his moral stance or weakening his stamina. If anything, these adversities, as he himself pointed out lately to an admiring elderly lady at a market [!] has made him more determined and steadfast in his purpose and resolve. 

After a long haul flight from France with a brief stopover in Bangkok, he arrived at Phnom Penh to a mass body of over half a million people flocking to the airport to welcome him home. His own party might have arranged for a large reception gathering to mark his historic return, yet the vast percentage of this massive crowd of people of all ages had chosen to ignore the lack of personal invitation and just turned up cheerfully for the occasion anyway! Such a turnout and show of solidarity with the opposition cause signals a sea change in the manner in which people perceive things of public relevance are governed and to be governed in the country, and a popular revolt against long suppressed discontent towards authority and the status quo. Even the party's strategists and organisers found their selves in a state of momentary shock by the show of strength in number that simply says: We want change. It was not until five hours later before Mr Rainsy and Mr Sokha finally reached their podium at 'Freedom Park' in the capital - a marathon journey for a short distance due to the slow moving traffic. The last time the people of Phnom Penh had witnessed anything on this scale was in April 1975 when the entire population of the capital was forced evacuated and frogmarched off to the countryside. 

After the long speech Rainsy had had to make time for interviews with foreign medias the same evening, and his next morning's schedule must have commenced quite early again for the next two weeks of election campaigning. If it had been School of Vice instead, don't expect to see him/her coming out of the house for the best part of the following two weeks spent recuperating from jet lag and other justified complaints! 

Finally, we note that some writers have recently brought up the story of Rainsy's father - Sam Sary - and his rumoured involvement with the CIA in connection with a plot to assassinate then Prince Sihanouk. Mr Sary was subsequently murdered for his reported "treason", and this rumoured past of Rainsy's family history has been frequently aired to throw doubt and question marks over Rainsy's own standing and motivations in pursuing his political career - Is he there to avenge the ignominious demise of his father by killing off the monarchy when the time will have come for him to do so? If the father was a 'traitor', could the son also be one too? Well, first of all, wasn't everyone who crossed his path with Sihanouk pronounced an outright 'traitor' and sent to his death or humiliation in some way? What if the CIA had succeeded in their rumoured plot to assassinate Sihanouk; would that have turned out to be such a bad thing after all that this man had put the Khmer people through from his time on the throne until his recent death? And what course would Cambodian history had taken instead in that scenario? 

The irony and reality are that it wasn't Rainsy or anyone else who had succeeded in seeing to the demise of the Cambodian monarchy [the Royal parties had won zero number of seat in this recent election] but it had been the active suicidal role of Sihanouk and the royals themselves, particularly, this had been the case for Sihanouk and his undoubtedly inept and self-serving son - Rannarith. The Monarchy itself as an ancient institution remains potent and popular, but it is not the institution or entity, fiendishly prostituted and pimped to no end and shame by the Norodom family for their self-serving ends. And that is that. Let history judge! – School of Vice

RE: Remarkable Signs of True Democracy for Cambodia and Myanmar

Note by School of Vice

Rainsy was the target of Hun Sen's assassination attempt in the 1997 grenade attack - it was nothing short of a miracle the former survived that brutal attack, but many of his followers, workers and bystanders as well as one of his own body guards had not been spared by this massacre. That is not a refutable event or fact.

In his own defence, Rainsy has stated that "the stakes are different" between him and Mu Sokhua. Yet, there is no question that both these people are placing their lives at grave risk just by being in Cambodia physically. A well known opposition leader of the Philippines had similarly returned to his country from exile abroad to be assassinated by President Marcos, and Rainsy faces the same risk of meeting the same fate every time he returns to Cambodia and steps off the plane at Po Chentong airport. Even if Hun Sen says or indicates that he won't kill anyone on order, can anyone in their right mind trust his words on anything?! Hun Sen is mentally sick; a madman who nonetheless wants to cling on to power regardless of the right or wrong of his actions towards anyone - it is the common denominator and pathological trait of tyrants the world over.

The circumstances of opposition activists in Burma and Cambodia and their personal and/ or public agendas or priorities therein are only fully appreciated by and known to them. Ho Chi-Minh had had to evade arrest and imprisonment by going about with a variety of false identity and passports, and by accepting lengthy spells in "self-imposed exile" too, yet no one has ever thought of Ho being anything other than one who was fully committed to his political cause - whatever that political cause might be!

Politicians have both their public and private lives to lead; sometimes the priorities of both spheres overlap and it is inevitable for these individuals to try to juggle these priorities off as best they can manage for their own sake, the sake of their family members, and that of their public duties. It would be wrong for us to expect them to follow specific patterns and examples set by someone else in their own other contexts and situations. If one is out to find faults and use these subjectively and maliciously to discredit or smear someone like Rainsy or anyone else, one is bound to come up with something, even if on critical and close, thorough examination this something turns out to be quite trivial or malicious in nature! Mahatma Gandhi of India used to publicly scold his long suffering wife [she was thirteen years old when they married -  a common norm in India at the time] for failing to account for the missing of a few rupees in public funds entrusted to their keeping! Gandhi also famously weaved and wore his own loin cloth - does Ms Suu Kyi also adhere to Gandhi's personal life-style and conduct in this strict sense? If not, does this imply that Ms Suu Kyi is falling short in our fair and balanced opinion of what constitutes a noble life worthy of respect and admiration? So many opposition activists in Burma, Cambodia, Africa and other nations on other continents have put their own welfare and lives on the line in defence of public and private freedom, and so many of them had suffered torture, exile, jail and ultimately the loss of a precious life, which, however, may not be precious to those like Mr Hun Sen and his sycophants or those who manipulate his action and movement for their own ulterior benefit and agendas, but it is still precious to these courageous activists nevertheless, who furthermore, have not all been Nobel Prize winners either? 

Enough said. But don’t be surprised to still read more malignant comments on this or other public issues meant to mislead and subvert public perception and opinion, thus deflecting these away from the real struggle for liberty and change; like those Cu Chi rat tunnels in Vietnam, these people will dig and gnaw their way out of any corner, literally!