Cambodians continue fighting Boeung Kak land grab

3 July 2012
Bretton Woods Project

The Cambodian government has been under a [World] Bank lending freeze over a controversial land-titling project, financed by the Bank, that resulted in the evictions of the Boeung Kak lake community in Phnom Penh (see Update 75). Following the violent repression of protests and the arrest of local activists in May, 127 Cambodian and international civil society groups sent a letter to then Bank president Robert Zoellick and president-elect Jim Yong Kim, urging the Bank to "ensure a fair resolution for the displaced and excluded families before the Bank provides any further financing to the [Cambodian government]". Natalie Bugalski and David Pred, of NGO Inclusive Development International, argued in June that the "Bank is in a rare position to push that agenda forward by making it clear that it will maintain the lending freeze until ... a comprehensive agreement is reached with the majority of Boeung Kak households who are still awaiting a remedy."

Bugalski also wrote a discussion paper, launched by NGO Equitable Cambodia and German political foundation Heinrich Boell in late May. Eang Vuthy of Equitable Cambodia explained that the paper "was written against a backdrop of increasing forced evictions, displacement and landlessness in Cambodia, and the regular granting of dubious economic land concessions that are now estimated to cover a total land mass equivalent to over half of the country’s arable land". In it, Bugalski proposes a framework for a human rights approach "to development interventions in the land sector [in Cambodia], in which processes and tools that elevate rights, transparency and accountability are incorporated throughout the project cycle and broader country strategy."

Cambodian communities facing forced eviction launch Inspection Panel complaint against World Bank

2 October 2009
Press Release

Phnom Penh residents facing the largest forced displacement of Cambodians since the Khmer Rouge era have filed a complaint to the World Bank Inspection Panel stating that they have suffered serious harm from a Bank-funded land-titling project.

For immediate release

October 1, 2009

Phnom Penh, Residents facing the largest forced displacement of Cambodians since the Khmer Rouge era have filed a complaint to the World Bank Inspection Panel stating that they have suffered serious harm from a Bank-funded land-titling project. The complaint, submitted by the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) and registered on 24 September, alleges that the Bank breached its operational policies by failing to adequately supervise the Land Management and Administration Project (LMAP), which has denied urban poor and other vulnerable households protection against widespread tenure insecurity and increasing forced evictions in Cambodia.

A major report about the Bank-financed project, “Untitled: Tenure Insecurity and Inequality in the Cambodian Land Sector,” was also released this week by three international human rights organizations, Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE), Jesuit Refugee Services (JRS) and Bridges Across Borders Southeast Asia (BABSEA).

“The principal finding of the report is that, despite a seven-year, multi-million dollar effort to reform the land sector, Cambodia’s land administration institutions have failed to improve tenure security for vulnerable groups, who are routinely and arbitrarily denied access to land titling and dispute resolution mechanisms,” stated Salih Booker, Executive Director of COHRE.

Despite having legitimate rights to the land under Cambodia’s Land Law, thousands of families residing around Phnom Penh’s Boeung Kak lake were denied titles when the area was adjudicated by LMAP in January 2007, the same month that a well-connected developer acquired a legally dubious 99-year lease over the area. Residents have since been subjected to intimidation and pressure to leave their homes by the developer and local officials. So far, an estimated 900 families have been evicted from their land to make way for the development, with more than 3000 families due to face the same fate.

The NGO report states that “[t]he fact that these households do not have title is often used against them as a justification for eviction, despite the fact that many have well documented rights under the law.” “Meanwhile,” the report continues, “the wealthy and well-connected have little difficulty in acquiring land title in high value areas in which poor communities reside due to their connections or their ability to pay the high ‘unofficial fees’.”

Both the complaint and the report cite numerous flaws of LMAP, including a failure to issue titles to vulnerable households in accordance with legal procedures, ineffective and corrupt dispute resolution mechanisms, and a failure to conduct essential public awareness campaigns and legal aid programs.

The report identifies the absence of transparent State land management as a key failure of LMAP, which has contributed to the problem of tenure insecurity throughout the country. It states that the lack of transparency and an unimplemented or inadequate legal framework has led to the loss of public spaces in both urban and rural settings, as well as the large-scale depletion of the country’s natural resources, especially forests.

“The mismanagement of State land has negatively impacted the poorest Cambodians most,” said BABSEA Director David Pred. “Rural and indigenous communities have been deprived of the land on which their lives depend in order to make way for Economic Land Concessions, and poor urban households have been denied the opportunity to secure their land tenure despite their legal entitlements, when they are wrongly labelled as squatters on State land.”

Boeung Kak residents who filed the complaint against the World Bank have requested to remain anonymous, citing concerns for their safety amidst increasing intimidation and harassment of human rights defenders and political dissidents in Cambodia.

The Cambodian government abruptly ended its agreement on the project with the World Bank last month after a disagreement about the applicability of World Bank social safeguards in cases like Boeung Kak. Despite the government’s termination of the agreement, human rights groups have demanded that the Cambodian government continue to be held accountable for its contractual obligations to adhere to the project’s policy on involuntary resettlement.

“In light of the serious problems with the design and implementation of LMAP, it is incumbent upon the World Bank to conduct a thorough investigation of this project and its overall assistance strategy in Cambodia,” said Pred. “After seven years of wholly inadequate supervision of LMAP, the Bank has a responsibility to investigate and remedy the harms that have been caused to the Cambodian families who have been unfairly denied recognition of their land rights.”

“The World Bank should reconsider its approach to land titling programmes that it promotes worldwide, especially in countries without strong rule of law and the political will to protect people’s rights against powerful interests,” Booker added. “Through the Inspection Panel’s investigation, the World Bank can and should learn important lessons from LMAP.”
The notice of registration of the complaint is available at:

http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTINSPECTIONPANEL/Resources/Notice_of_Registration.pdf

Read the report:
Untitled: Tenure Insecurity and Inequality in the Cambodian Land Sector, Jesuit Relief Services, October 2009 (Acrobat PDF, 1.38 MB)

For more information, please contact:

David Pred
BABSEA Director
davidpred@babsea.org
+855 92 285954

Dan Nicholson
Coordinator,
COHRE Asia and Pacific Programme
dan@cohre.org
+66884030093

Natalie Bugalski
COHRE Legal Officer
natalie@cohre.org
+855 17 523276

City's poor unable to hold land

Thursday, 16 July 2009
SEBASTIAN STRANGIO AND MAY TITTHARA

In a March 4 letter from the CLEC to World Bank Country Director Annette Dixon, a copy of which has been obtained by the Post, lawyers noted that Group 78 had received several "illegal" eviction notices and its applications for land title were rejected by city authorities.

The Phnom Penh Post

Activists say govt's titling scheme ignores its most vulnerable citizens.

Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN
Group 78 residents protest at Canadia Bank’s head office Wednesday as part of a last-ditch effort to avoid eviction.

THE impending eviction of the city's Group 78 community is the latest example of the failure of a World Bank-funded land-titling programme intended to improve tenure security for the urban poor, housing rights activists say.

Since 2002, the World Bank has funded a large part of the government's $38.4 million Land Management and Administration Project (LMAP), which was designed to establish an "efficient and transparent land administration system" in Cambodia by 2007, according to an early project appraisal.

The project, which also receives funding from the German, Finnish and Canadian governments, was recently extended through the end of this year.

But rights groups say that for besieged urban communities such as Group 78, which faces eviction from its Bassac riverfront site Friday, LMAP's efforts have so far done little good.

"The ineffectiveness of LMAP in securing [the] land rights of the urban poor is laid bare in the case of Group 78," said Natalie Bugalski, a legal officer at the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions.

"Households had clear evidence of possession rights but were denied access to the titling programme," she said, adding that the dispute had yet to be resolved "in accordance with the law".

Man Vuthy, a legal coordinator at the Community Legal Education Centre (CLEC), which represents Group 78, said that if the World Bank does not take action after the eviction of Group 78 residents, LMAP will have "failed".

He said that World Bank officials had met several times with CLEC lawyers to discuss land issues, but that they had neglected poor urban communities involved in land disputes in an effort to maintain a stable relationship with the government.

"We know the World Bank works peacefully with the authorities, but this is the last chance for the community," he said.

"The mechanisms don't work well, and it is only the World Bank that can help them."

On Tuesday, the Court of Appeal upheld a Friday eviction deadline for Group 78 after lawyers attempted to halt an April 20 eviction notice.

The government says residents are illegally squatting on land belonging to the state and to Sour Srun Enterprises, a local developer.

But Group 78 claims ownership of its Tonle Bassac commune site under Article 30 of the Kingdom's 2001 Land Law, which allows individuals to claim title over land if they have been in peaceful possession of it for five years prior to 2001. Many residents claim they have lived at the site since the mid-1980s.

Some say the strength of the community's claim only underlines the failures of the LMAP program.

In a March 4 letter from the CLEC to World Bank Country Director Annette Dixon, a copy of which has been obtained by the Post, lawyers noted that Group 78 had received several "illegal" eviction notices and its applications for land title were rejected by city authorities.

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The group 78 case is ... an important test case for the implementation of the lmap and the rule of law...

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"The Group 78 case is therefore an important test case for the implementation of the LMAP and the rule of law in Cambodia," the letter stated.

On April 30, Dixon wrote to Minister of Economy and Finance Keat Chhon to inform him that evictions could "damage the reputation of the Government as it moves to undertake important reforms in the land sector".

Dixon added: "We would suggest that a temporary moratorium on evictions be declared until such a legal and policy framework is in place, which would send a positive signal."

The LMAP project's appraisal document sets out contingencies to be followed regarding land dispute cases.

The document states the project "includes support for strengthening mechanisms of dispute resolution". It adds that the project would be "scaled back if [government] commitment to a fair process of dispute resolution is inadequate".

Housing rights activists say there has been a marked lack of progress on the ground.

David Pred, director of Bridges Across Borders Southeast Asia (BAB), said that while LMAP set out to "improve tenure security" for urban and rural land-holders and "reduce land conflict and land-grabbing", the opposite trend was evident.

"We have witnessed a significant increase in land disputes, land-grabbing and forced evictions over the past seven years," he said.

He added: "We have observed that the communities in Phnom Penh who are most vulnerable to displacement, like the residents of Group 78 ...
have been denied access to the land titling and dispute resolution systems established by LMAP."

Mark Grimsditch, a BAB legal adviser, said that just 38,502 out of a projected 198,000 titles had been distributed by LMAP in Phnom Penh since 2002.

He said a number of eligible cases - including communities facing eviction at Boeung Kak lake - had been adjudicated but fell "at the final hurdle" after being arbitrarily denied their title certificates.

Though she described supervision by LMAP's donors as "inadequate", Bugalski said most of the blame fell on local authorities.

"The primary responsibility to ensure tenure security and protect against forced evictions lies with the Cambodian government," she said.

Criticisms of LMAP came as Group 78 representatives met with World Bank officials Wednesday in a last-ditch attempt to delay their scheduled eviction by city authorities.

Earlier, they protested outside Canadia Bank, which they claimed is in charge of a plan to build a bridge over the Tonle Bassac. The bridge project prompted the city to claim portions of the community's land, where it plans to build a road.

But Rath Kumnith, a legal adviser to Canadia Bank, said the bank was only providing a loan to the project and was not directly involved in it.

The World Bank was contacted for comment Thursday but had not responded as of press time.

UN calls on Cambodia to protect land of indigenous people

Wednesday, August 8, 2007
The Associated Press

"A wealthy and powerful social class has emerged on the back of the state through the exploitation of the people and the country's resources, relying on access to, and accumulation through, the apparatus of the state" - Yash Ghai's report to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: The United Nations criticized Cambodia's government Wednesday for doing little to protect the land of indigenous people, whose livelihood has increasingly come under threat from land-grabbing by the rich and powerful.

The government needs to take swift action to halt land-grabbing in tribal areas, the U.N. Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Cambodia said in a statement Wednesday. The statement was released to mark the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples on Thursday.

"There are continuing concerns about the protection of indigenous land. Of particular concern is the growing number of economic land concessions and mining licenses granted over indigenous land, without community consultation," it said.

Members of the Tampoun ethnic minority in the remote northeastern province of Rattanakiri said Wednesday they were forced to bury their tribal chief at a new site after their ancestral graveyard was sold to a private owner, an action they feared could bring them bad luck.

The U.N. office noted that Cambodia's land law passed in 2001 recognizes the right of indigenous communities to collective ownership of their lands, which includes land reserved for shifting cultivation.

But in the six years since then, "not a single collective land title" had been issued to any indigenous community by the government, it said.

In recent years, land disputes have become frequent occurrences in Cambodia, usually pitting poor farmers against developers. Several people have been killed.

Yash Ghai, the U.N. secretary-general's special representative for human rights in Cambodia, expressed deep concern about ethnic minority groups losing out on land to business allies of the government.

"A wealthy and powerful social class has emerged on the back of the state through the exploitation of the people and the country's resources, relying on access to, and accumulation through, the apparatus of the state," he said in his report to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights in June.

Instead of helping the indigenous people, "the government tilts in favor of business companies whenever their interests clash with the interests of rural or urban people," he said.

The government called his allegations unacceptable.

In the Rattanakiri case, the relatives of Bou Nuth, a 76-year-old tribal chief who died Sunday, were barred from burying his body in their ancestral graveyard, said Tev Mak, the deceased man's nephew.

Instead, they had to bury him about 1 kilometer away from their village, contrary to tradition that says the deceased must be buried near their home, he said.

Seng Thung, a village chief, said the old graveyard, covering about four hectares (10 acres), was sold to a senior provincial official in recent years by an unknown individual who had claimed ownership over the property.

Sak Son, a provincial district deputy governor, dismissed the villagers' claim the land was their ancestral graveyard, saying only that it belongs to a provincial official whom he declined to name.

WB president: Land titling is key to overcome poverty in Cambodia

2007-08-05

PHNOM PENH, Aug. 5 (Xinhua) -- World Bank (WB) President Robert Zoellick said here on Sunday the land titling progress is at the heart of a strategy to overcome poverty in Cambodia and spread the benefits of a growing economy.

The land titling progress enables poor Cambodians to own a stake in both their own future and that of their country, Zoellick said at a press conference, adding that having property rights would also enable people to invest in their farms, small business and household to improve their finance security and their lives.

With support from the WB-financed land management and administration project, the Cambodian government is issuing more than 20,000 titles a month, mostly in rural areas, with 80 percent of the titles registered jointly by wife and husband or female-headed households, he said.

However, many poor people remain landless in Cambodia, Zoellick said, adding that some powerful people are seeking to dominate large tract. He said that Cambodia still faces a huge task of reclaiming productive land and clearing millions of landmines laid during decades of conflicts.

Zoellick presided over a ceremony to hand over land titles to nearly 800 owners in Cambodia after arriving in this country on Saturday.

During the two-day visit, Zoellick met on Sunday with Prime Minister Hun Sen, a number of high-ranking officials, representatives of the private sector and civil society, and locals who have benefited from WB projects, according to a government press release.