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| Can you trust this comrade? |
April 5, 2011
ABC Radio Australia
Non-government groups say the Cambodian Prime Minister's comments about his relatively modest salary don't tell the full story about his wealth.
More than 100,000 state officials and heads of civilian organisations are required to declare their property, vehicles, business interests and other assets under the anti-graft law, passed in 2010. On the first of April, Prime Minister Hun Sen declared his assets to the country's new Anti-Corruption Unit.
Under the law, that declaration remains confidential... However, afterwards, Hun Sen told reporters he earned a monthly salary of 1,150 US dollars. The comments were criticised by Mam Sitha, president of the non-governmental group, Cambodia Independent Anti-Corruption Committee, who said there was an "imbalance between the size of his salary and his current wealth."
Presenter: Liam Cochrane
Speaker: George Boden, Global Witness campaigner
BODEN: Ahh I think it would be very difficult to believe that Hun Sen and his family were only living off the wages that he declared to reporters recently. I think that'd be unrealistic and certainly looking at some of his assets and some of the things that he's known to have, he seems to have a lot more wealth than that. I think one of the biggest concerns about the assets that he actually declared in his declaration, they don't include a whole series of different things, so money in foreign bank accounts etc., I don't think would be disclosed in that kind of disclosure. And even if he did disclose it, nobody has access to that asset declaration anyhow, so it would be very difficult to ascertain the information.
COCHRANE: You're talking about bank accounts offshore?
BODEN: Certainly we don't know, it's important to state that as an organisation although we've managed to ascertain some of the business interests of people very close to Hun Sen, we've never found any revelations that was explicitly about him. But my point is more general in that the asset declarations for senior officials and other officials required to declare, doesn't necessarily include all of the ways that people can keep money. So it might include houses and salaries for example, it wouldn't necessarily include all of the bank account information. So it's not a true and accurate picutre of the entire wealth of an individual.
COCHRANE: Has there ever been an estimate as to Hun Sen's wealth or earning capabilities?
BODEN: I have heard informally, a rumour that certainly he's worth if not hundreds of millions, I think I've even heard a billion. But I think he's very, very wealthy and I think it would be very difficult given the way that the people, that that amount of money it's just incredibly difficult to get an idea. But I think it's fair to say that he certainly seems to have a lot more than the one-thousand dollars a month that he claims.
