Illegal immigrants and democracy in Cambodia - Op-Ed by Salen Sy

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Filipina linked to scams arrested in US

06/28/2010
By Jun Medina
INQUIRER.net (The Philippines)

WASHINGTON DC, United States—Federal authorities arrested last week Mary Ann Smith, a Filipina who is wanted in the Philippines, for allegedly defrauding immigrants trying to bring family members in the United States.

Smith, vice president for marketing of International Business Network (IBN), was apprehended by agents of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Seattle, Washington following intense investigation by the enforcement arm of the Department of Homeland Security in cooperation with Better Business Bureau (BBB) of Central Virginia.

"We received a complaint a year ago from a consumer who had paid thousands of dollars to secure visas for Cambodian relatives to enter the US," said Tom Gallagher, the local BBB’s president and CEO. "Even after receiving more than $40,000, IBN allegedly demanded payment of additional fees to cover such things as health insurance."

Gallagher said part of the funds was to be used for the purchase of airline tickets, but the tickets were never purchased.

Gallagher said his office received similar complaints, prompting them to investigate with the help of federal agents.

“We’re delighted that we can assist law enforcement in shutting down scam artists of this kind. There’s no place for a company like this in a marketplace that strives to operate with trust and integrity,” Gallagher said.

In Manila, Vera Files last week reported that Smith (formerly Mary Ann Maslog) has been implicated in a P200-million textbook scam in 1999 and has a standing arrest warrant from the Sandiganbayan for allegedly trying to bribe Budget and Management officials.

Smith, then married to Rommel Maslog (who was elected vice mayor of Talisayan, Misamis Oriental in last month's elections) was summoned in 1999 by the Senate Blue Ribbon and Education, Arts and Culture Committees during investigations of corruption in the purchase of the textbooks for public schools.

She had delivered P3 million to the office of then Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno, who asked National Bureau of Investigation to investigate the matter, Vera Files said.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported in its June 16 issue that Smith, 41, is awaiting extradition to Memphis, Tennessee, where she will stand trial for her role in IBN, the Virginia company that used to maintain offices in Henrico County at Paragon Place off Glenside Drive and received money to facilitate student visas for students coming to the United States.

The company charged as much as $6,480 per student to gain access to visas when, according to a federal indictment issued in Memphis, "visa 'fixers” or 'brokers' had no special access to the United States government that could enable such individuals, agencies, or companies to arrange for a student visa."

In some cases, the company also offered permanent resident status or green cards, according to the April indictment. Unidentified victims lost about $34,000, officials said.

The Times-Dispatch report cited the case of Chesterfield County businessman, Tany Roth, who said that he lost as much as $45,000 to IBN in an effort to bring three relatives to this country from Cambodia for study and to facilitate an adoption.

Roth said he sent the company checks but never received any services, and that Smith canceled meetings and disappeared. Roth's experience is not part of the federal indictment.

Smith is charged with six counts of wire fraud and two counts of mail fraud. No trial date has been scheduled.

Following reports of Smith's arrest, more victims are coming forward with different kinds of scams, big and small.

For instance, Filipino journalist Ellen Tordesillas reported about a US-based Filipina who said she was victimized by Mary Ann and her American husband, Michael Lee Smith.

“She (Smith) posed as someone from Grant USA and they gave us seminars on grant writing where about 10 of us paid $50 each for a one-day seminar,” the woman, who asked that her identity be withheld, told Tordesillas. “They claimed to have an office in Makati. We later found out about a month after our seminar that they’re not connected with Grant USA.”

The woman added, “I just want to attest that she’s been going in and out of the Philippines, and I am certain that she and Michael Smith have been victimizing Filipinos through their lies because that’s what they did to us.”

Vera Files earlier reported that Smith is also facing charges of grand theft amounting to more than $100,000 and scheme to defraud in the amount of $50,000.

Investors expect continued growth following CPP win

Prime Minister Hun Sen waves to the people from a campaign poster in front of the Naga Casino in Phnom Penh. (Photo: AFP)

Monday, 11 August 2008
Written by Kay Kimsong and George McLeod
The Phnom Penh Post

Political stability makes investors and business leaders happy, but opposition predicts corruption and poverty will only worsen

WITH the Cambodian People's Party having a solid majority to form the next government, some investors say they expect stability and strong growth in the coming mandate.

"A government led by the same leader is a government with more experience in business and trade. I hope there will not be much change," said Chan Sophal, director of the Cambodian Economic Association.

"The general view is that the political situation is more stable than five to ten years ago," agreed Acleda Bank director Peter Kooi. "Our customers want stability. They are saying if there is stability we will invest our money."

But Kooi urged the incoming government to focus on creating employment.

"There are three things the government should be focusing on - jobs, jobs and jobs....Less than 10 percent of university graduates are finding jobs," he said.

However, opposition lawmaker Yim Sovann said the ruling party has failed to deliver on promises to fight corruption and poverty, and that this would impact the economy.

"I think the government being ruled by the CPP alone will be worse than the previous one," he said.

"The CPP has ruled Cambodia for more than 20 years already, but poverty remains high, [as well as] corruption, inflation, land grabbing, illegal logging and illegal immigration."

CPP lawmaker Cheam Yeap, however, said the new government would pass at least 20 laws, including anti-corruption legislation and a new criminal code, in the upcoming National Assembly session.

"I am sure foreign investors will see Cambodia as an attractive investment location," he told the Post.

The election in 2003 ended in a yearlong stalemate that saw opposition parties refusing to form a coalition with the CPP, causing uncertainty in the marketplace.

With a 2007 constitutional amendment allowing a party to form a government with a simple 50-percent-plus-one of the seats in the National Assembly, the CPP is now in a strong position to govern alone once official results are announced to confirm its majority.

Wishes From The Cambodia’s Border Commitee For 2008

La version Française se trouve en bas du texte en Anglais

WISHES
FROM THE CAMBODIA’s BORDER COMMITEE
FOR 2008

Dear Compatriots, Dear Friends,

In Cambodia, 2007 was another “excellent year” for the rulers of the regime and their henchmen, but unfortunately, it was one with alarming worsening of the national social division. Indeed, confronting a display of overflowing opulence by a dominating minority with unbounded power, more lamenting distresses are rising up each day, they are mournful and revolting cries joined by million from others who are broken by misery and injustice. Deforestation and land-grabbing are being pursued in total contempt of the rights of the people and the interests of the country. Two Cambodian societies are pitted against one another and they are dramatically clashing with each other as the stronger ones no longer spare their discrimination and their repression against the weaker ones.

We must pay tribute to the accurate viewpoints presented by the UN Special Envoy, Prof. Yash Ghai, who recently, found that “Cambodia is not a State with the rule of law” and that her citizens, in their everyday living, are in fear of everything, “fear of the state, fear of political and economic saboteurs, fear of greedy individuals and corporations, fear of the police and the courts - describes the plight of numerous communities and families in Cambodia.” A distressing finding on the consequences of a regime which never respect national and international laws, and, in particular, never respect the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements on Cambodia, nor any democratic principle.

One of the telltale signs of the national social division, which were announced by the World Bank in the past few years, are the disproportionate income gaps between the ruling class and the popular masses. The “economic” development, loudly hailed by the regime “super Strongman” Hun Sen and his colleagues, turns out to be, at the social level, an expansion and a reinforcement of the slave system which was, in fact, established since of their arrival to power. Today, the bosses and the nouveau rich people do not recognize any rights, nor do they recognize the dignity of their poor employees and servants. Financial speculations and land disputes are amplified all over the country, along with the steadily increasing number of abusive evictions and savage expulsions by the authorities and their rich sponsors. Tragedies are growing throughout the cities and the countryside, the sound of revolts thunders, and, more than ever, the police force brutally represses all the citizens’ inkling to express their opinions or their dissatisfactions. The same situation can also be found among our compatriots living along the border areas with Vietnam, from Ratanakiri, to Kampot provinces, who are subjected to the rule of the financial opportunists and the encroaching Vietnamese militia. Along the Thai borders, under the new hazardous policy of “two kingdoms, one destination,” our borders are no longer being protected, Thai soldiers even came inside our country, Cambodia, to arrest and removed our compatriots whom they accused of committing “mistakes,” meanwhile, our tourist wealth is placed at the disposal of this neighbor, including our national heritage, such as the Prasat Ta Moan Temple and its surrounding areas which are being annexed by Thailand.

Another sign of social division was opened up for several years now, regarding the issues of Cambodian citizenship and the rights to vote. While million of Vietnamese immigrants almost automatically obtain a Cambodia identity card and thus becomes voters (for the Cambodian People’s Party or CPP), several millions of Cambodian people, unable to grease the paws of the authorities to obtain their ID card, are deprived of one and they are thus considered as foreigners in their own land. Violent religious repressions against Khmer Buddhist monks from Kampuchea Krom (the former Cochinchina) were, in fact, based on the refusal by the current regime to grant them the Cambodian citizenship, whereas they always enjoyed such right up until 1975. However, Mr. Heng Samrin, National Assembly President, declared in May 2007 that “the problems (evictions, harassments and persecutions) of the Cambodian people living in Kampuchea Krom (are) Vietnam’s internal affairs exclusively.” Therefore, in June of this year, Venerable Tim Sakhorn, Abbot of the Cambodian Phnom Den pagoda, located in Takeo province, who lived in Cambodia since 1979, was disrobed by his religious superiors, then, under the pretext that he was born in Kampuchea Krom, he was deported by the regime’s secret police to Vietnam to be judged there for “providing (meager) financial aids” to his unhappy compatriots still living in his native land.

Dear Compatriots and Dear Friends,

We noticed that under the Pol Pot (Khmer Rouge) regime, the worsening of this national social division represented a fatal danger for our Nation and for all of us, Cambodians. Nobody will be able to escape from it. The danger of the Vietnamization of Cambodia grows every single day. We have the sacred DUTY to defend our country, and most of all, to protect our society from this plague, and to protect our brothers and sisters from misery and misfortune. Their misery, misfortune and decline are also the reflections of our own misery, misfortune and decline, whether today or tomorrow. Henceforth, we must show them our fraternity, our compassion for their fates and our constant solidarity with them, we must not scorn them, nor give them up.

This duty cannot be achieved without LOVE, the love of one’s family, of one’s millennium society, of the beautiful traditions and customs of one’s country.

In the name of the Cambodia’s Border Committee, I wish that 2008 will be for each and every one of you a new source of love and energy so that you may bring assistance to our unfortunate compatriots and so that you may be united as a solid block to defend our Nation and our Homeland.

May 2008 be a very good year for all of you, both in Cambodia and all over the world, so that you may have a better life and a greater happiness to live among your respective families.

Done in Paris, December 28, 2007

For the Cambodia’s Border Committee
in France and Worldwide,

Sean Péngsè

o O o

VOEUX
DU COMITE DES FRONTIERES DU CAMBODGE
POUR L’ANNEE 2008

Chers Compatriotes, Chers Amis,

Au Cambodge, l’année 2007 a été encore une « excellente année » pour les maîtres du régime et leurs alliés, mais elle était malheureusement celle d’une alarmante aggravation de la fracture nationale. En effet, face à une débordante opulence d’une minorité dominatrice aux pouvoirs sans limite, se sont élevés chaque jour davantage des cris de détresse, lugubres et révoltants, des millions d’autres brisés par la misère et l’injustice. La déforestation et la dépossession des terres s’étaient poursuivies de plus belle, au mépris des droits des habitants et des intérêts du pays. Deux sociétés khmères s’étaient donc dressées face à face et s’affrontaient dramatiquement, les forts ne ménageant plus leur discrimination et leurs répressions contre les faibles.

Nous devons rendre hommage à la justesse de vue du Représentant spécial du Secrétaire général de l’ONU, M. Yash GHAI, qui a récemment trouvé encore que « le Cambodge n'est pas un Etat de droit » et que les citoyens, dans leur vie quotidienne, ont peur de tout, « peur de l’Etat, peur des saboteurs politiques et économiques, peur de la cupidité des individus et des groupes organisés, peur de la police et des tribunaux, ce qui explique l’extrême misère de nombreuses communautés et familles au Cambodge ». Un constat de plus en plus angoissant sur les conséquences d’un régime qui n’a jamais voulu respecter aucun droit national et international, notamment les Accords de Paris de 1991, et aucun principe démocratique.

L’un des signes de la fracture nationale, signalé depuis quelques années par la Banque Mondiale, est l’accroissement démesuré de l’écart des revenus de la classe dirigeante et ceux des masses populaires. Le développement « économique », tant vanté par le « super homme fort » Hun Sen et ses associés, s’est traduit, au plan social, par l’élargissement et le renforcement du système esclavagiste établi, en fait, dès leur arrivée au pouvoir. Aujourd’hui, les patrons et les nouveaux riches ne reconnaissent aucun droit, ni aucune dignité à leurs pauvres employés ou serviteurs. Les spéculations financières et les conflits fonciers se sont amplifiés partout dans le pays, par le nombre sans cesse grandissant des expropriations abusives et des expulsions sauvages de la part des autorités et de leurs riches commanditaires. Les tragédies se sont multipliées à travers les villes et les campagnes et la révolte gronde, et, plus que jamais, la police réprime brutalement toutes velléités des citoyens d’exprimer leurs opinions ou de manifester leur mécontentement. La même situation se retrouve chez nos compatriotes des zones frontalières avec le Vietnam, de Ratanakiri à Kampot, soumis, eux, à la loi des affairistes et des milices vietnamiens. Du côté thaïlandais, sous la nouvelle politique hasardeuse de « deux royaumes et une seule destination », nos frontières ne sont plus protégées, des soldats thaïs sont même venus arrêtés et enlevés nos compatriotes, « fautifs » à leurs yeux, à l’intérieur de notre pays, pendant que nos richesses touristiques soient mis à la disposition du voisin, et, pour commencer, nos patrimoines, dont le temple ancien Prasat Ta Moan et ses environs, soient annexés par celui-ci.

Une autre ligne de fracture est ouverte depuis plusieurs années par la question de la nationalité cambodgienne et le droit de vote. Alors que des millions d’immigrés vietnamiens obtiennent quasi automatiquement une carte d’identité cambodgienne et deviennent des électeurs (pour le Parti du Peuple du Cambodge, PPC), d’autres millions de Khmers, faute de pouvoir payer les autorités, en sont privés et sont donc considérés comme des étrangers dans leur propre pays. Les violentes répressions religieuses à l’encontre des bonzes bouddhistes khmers originaires du Kampuchea Krom (ex Cochinchine) étaient fondées, en fait, sur le refus du régime actuel de leur accorder la nationalité cambodgienne, alors que, depuis toujours et jusqu’en 1975, ils en jouissaient de droit. M. Heng Samrin, président de l’Assemblée Nationale, a cependant déclaré en mai 2007 que « les problèmes (les expropriations, les brimades et les persécutions religieuses) des Khmers du Kampuchea Krom (relevaient) exclusivement des affaires intérieures du Vietnam ». Ainsi, en juin suivant, le Vénérable TIM Sakhorn, chef d’une pagode cambodgienne de Phnom Den, Takèo, vivant au Cambodge depuis 1979, a été « défroqué » par ses supérieurs religieux, puis, parce qu’il est originaire du Kampuchea Krom, a été emmené par la police secrète au Vietnam pour y être jugé pour « avoir apporté (quelques maigres) secours financiers» à ses malheureux compatriotes de son pays natal.

Chers Compatriotes et Chers Amis,

Nous l’avons déjà constaté sous le régime de Pol Pot, l’aggravation de cette fracture nationale est un danger mortel pour notre Nation, pour nous tous, Khmers. Personne n’y échappera. Le danger de la vietnamisation du Cambodge grandit d’ailleurs chaque jour. Nous avons le DEVOIR sacré de défendre notre pays, et d’abord notre société de la dégénérescence, nos frères et sœurs de la misère et du malheur. Leur misère, leur malheur et leur déchéance sont aussi les images de notre propre misère, de notre propre malheur et de notre propre déchéance, pour aujourd’hui ou pour demain. Dorénavant, nous devons leur témoigner notre fraternité, notre compassion pour leurs sorts et notre solidarité à tous les instants, non pas les mépriser, ni les abandonner.

Ce devoir ne peut s’accomplir sans AMOUR, l’amour de sa famille, de sa société millénaire, des belles traditions et coutumes de son pays.

Au nom du Comité des Frontières du Cambodge, je souhaite profondément que l’année 2008 soit pour chacun de vous une nouvelle source d’amour et d’énergie pour que vous puissiez apporter votre aide à nos malheureux compatriotes et vous unir en un bloc plus solide, pour la défense de notre Nation et de notre Patrie.

Que l’année 2008 soit également une très bonne année pour vous tous, au Cambodge et dans le monde, pour que vous retrouviez une vie meilleure et un plus grand bonheur de vivre au sein de votre famille respective.

Paris, le 28 décembre 2007
P. Le Comité des Frontières du Cambodge
en France et dans le Monde

Sean Péngsè

VN's confession to illegal Vietnamese immigration into Cambodia or is it a pretext to arrest Montagnard people?

April 14, 2007
Illegal immigration con-artist jailed

VNA (Hanoi)

A 38 year old fraudster who organised illegal immigration into Cambodia from Vietnam was sentenced to two years in prison, by the Kon Tum provincial court, on April 13.

A Kak and nine other Central Highlands residents were arrested by Cambodian police in O Ya Dao district, on December 30, 2006 and extradited to Vietnam later.

On January 5, 2007, A Kak was prosecuted by Kon Tum province’s police for “masterminding illegal immigrations.”

He pleaded guilty to immigration fraud and admitted that he had organised cross-border migration for people through jungle tracks. Kak also admitted that he had duped his unsuspecting victims by promising well-paid jobs for them once they arrived in Cambodia and charged a brokerage fee of between 2 and VND 3 million for each victim.

The court also ordered Kak to pay VND 6 million in restitution to his victims.

Study to be performed on visa exemption for Vietnamese businessmen

Friday, March 02, 2007

By Kong Sothanarith
Cambodge Soir
Translated from French by Luc Sâr

“First of all, we must ascertain that we will come out winner at the economic level. Furthermore, we must be careful that this visa exemption does not turn out to be a means to enter Cambodia illegally” - Moeung Sonn, President of the tourism industry association of Cambodia

Visa exemption for Vietnamese businessmen? That was the question asked during the visit of Nguyen Minh Triet, Vietnam president, who was accompanied by some 50 Vietnamese businessmen. The Cambodian government will think about this issue which was raised during a Cambodian-Vietnamese business forum where businessmen from both countries met.

“The government sets in motion a policy that encourages investors to come to Cambodia. We will discuss in detail this issue with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and of Commerce,” Thong Khon, the Minister of Tourism, said.

On Wednesday, President Nguyen Minh Triet said that Cambodia provides good investment opportunities in various sectors – agriculture, tourism, mining, commerce and industry – and he launched an appeal to Vietnamese businessmen to explore these opportunities.

A visa exemption for these businessmen could generate significant revenues, Thong khon said. “One visa earns us $20 or $25. However, if an exemption will allow us to develop the country’s economy, then we will earn even more,” Thon Khon noted.

Nevertheless, not everybody shares his enthusiasm. Moeung Sonn, President of the tourism industry association of Cambodia, is more reserved on this issue. “Businessmen have money. $20 is nothing to them. Why are don’t they want to pay?” he said. For Moeung Sonn, the government must look closely into this issue before giving its green light. “First of all, we must ascertain that we will come out winner at the economic level. Furthermore, we must be careful that this visa exemption does not turn out to be a means to enter Cambodia illegally,” Moeung Sonn said.

Currently, four border posts located in Svay Rieng (Moc Bai), Kompong Cham (Trapaing Phlong), Kandal (Ka’om Samnor) and Takeo (Phnom Den) allow access between the 2 countries.