Suy Sem's land-grabbing case - Op-Ed by Anonymous

Farmers fear deal has strings

Villagers from Kampong Chhnang’s Lorpeang Village, pictured last year, have recently been granted permission to farm land that has been disputed since 2007 with the KDC company. Photograph: Derek Stout/Phnom Penh Post

CPP Land Thief Chea Kheng, the wife of CPP minister Suy Sem (Photo:Mondulkeo, RFA)

Wednesday, 30 May 2012
Chhay Channyda
The Phnom Penh Post

Forty Kampong Chhnang villagers embroiled in a long-running land dispute with KDC International, a company owned by the wife of a senior CPP official, farmed contested land without interference on Monday, prompting some to wonder if they were being coaxed to vote for the ruling party in the coming commune elections.

Villagers were confused as to why no one barred them from the land, which is claimed by KDC and its owner Chea Kheng, wife of CPP-affiliated Industry, Mines and Energy Minister Suy Sem.

However, village representative Reach Seima suspects the new accommodation is simply because “it’s time to vote”.

“When we entered, the guard told us to bring more villagers to [farm] on this land,” he said. “We wondered is that a trick of the company? [The CPP] are good to us because they don’t want to lose votes.”

Small victory for villagers

Villagers embroiled in a land dispute with the KDC company at their homes in Kampong Chhnang province in September last year. (Photo by Drek Stout)

Suy Sem (front row) sitting next to Chea Kheng, his wife

Wednesday, 11 April 2012
Chhay Channyda
The Phnom Penh Post

The Kampong Chhnang provincial court yesterday ordered the KDC company to produce proof of ownership for 105 land titles in the Kampong Tralach district, the subject of a land dispute that dates back to 2007.

Long Lun, attorney for 70-year-old Chat Batt from the Lorpeang village, who claims KDC unlawfully grabbed her land without payment, said yesterday he welcomed the court’s decision, which will force the company to prove their debated ownership of the land.

“The court also requested cadastral officials to file all relevant land measurements,” the attorney said.

In 2007, Lorpeang villagers claim that the KDC company, owned by Chea Kheng, wife of the Minister of Industry, Mines and Energy Suy Sem, took more than 500 hectares of their farmland with no payment or agreement. The company insists the land was purchased properly.

Complaint rejected in high-profile land case

Chea Kheng standing next to her husband Suy Sem, the minister of Industry, Mines and Energy

Wednesday, 22 June 2011
Chhay Channyda
The Phnom Penh Post

Villagers in Kampong Chhnang province who have been locked for years in a land dispute with a firm owned by the wife of a government minister said yesterday that the provincial court had rejected their attempt to file against the company.

The villagers say the firm is attempting to push them off their land illegally and that they first attempted to submit the complaint in 2009, though the complaint has not been processed as local officials turned down a request from the villagers to permit having their court fees waived.

Reach Seima, a representative for villagers in Kampong Chhnang’s Kampong Tralach district, Ta Chea commune, said villagers had sent a letter to the court earlier this month inquiring about the total court fee associated with their complaint.

Yesterday, however, he said he had received a call from Chhoun Sivin, director of the provincial court clerks, informing him that the complaint had been rejected because the villagers needed to file individual rather than joint complaints.

Asian NGOs condemn defamation suit on activist

Sam Chankea - Photo courtesy of ki-media.blogspot.com

27 February 2011
ALIRAN

More than two dozen Asian civil society groups have condemned the conviction of Sam Chankea, a Cambodian human rights defender, for the exercise of his right to freedom of expression.

We, the undersigned human rights NGOs, human rights defenders and women human rights defenders of Asia, deeply regret the conviction of Mr. Sam Chankea, provincial coordinator of the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (ADHOC).

Mr. Chankea is a human rights defender active in land rights issues in Kampong Chhnang province. He was charged with defamation under Article 305 of the New Penal Code by the KDC International Company, a development company allegedly owned by Lauk Chumteav Chea Kheng, the wife of the Minister of Mining and Energy in Cambodia. On 25 January 2011, the Kg. Chhnang Provincial Court ruled against Mr. Sam Chankea and ordered him to pay a 1 million Riel fine and an additional 3 million Riel in compensation. If he does not pay the 4 million Riel (approximately US$1,000), he faces imprisonment.

Mr. Sam Chankea was charged for defamation by the KDC International Company because of a statement he made during a radio interview on Radio Free Asia (RFA) on 26 December 2009. In this interview he expressed his opinion on an ongoing land case in Kampong Chhnang between 108 families and the KDC International Company. There is a pending case between the families of Kampong Chhang and the KDC International Company, but still, the KDC International Company sent in its machinery to undertake land levelling. Mr. Sam Chankea considered the activity of land levelling by the KDC Company as an unlawful act. He stated that “what the company has done is an act of violation since the court has yet to rule on the merits of the case. Therefore the company should suspend the activity and await the ruling on the merits of the case”.

Rights activist fined, the culprit gets away free: Justice-a-la-Hun Xen?

Sam Chankea, Adhoc’s provincial coordinator in Kampong Chhnang province (centre), speaks to reporters outside the provincial court earlier this month. (Photo by: Photo Supplied)

Suy Sem (L) and his wife Chea Kheng (R), the owner of KCD

Court Fines Rights Activist for ‘Defamation’

Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer
Phnom Penh Tuesday, 25 January 2011

“The court did not have evidence.”

Kampong Chhang provincial court ordered a human rights worker to pay nearly $1,000 in damages and fines Tuesday, after defamation charges were brought against him by a powerful company.

Sam Chankea, a Kampong Chhnang coordinator for the rights group Adhoc, will pay $750 in damages to the KCD Company, which reportedly belongs to the wife of the Minister of Industry, Mines and Energy.

He was charged with defamation, a criminal charge, in May 2010, after giving an interview to Radio Free Asia on a land dispute between KCD and 64 families who said they were being pushed off nearly 150 hectares of land in Kampong Tralach district.

CCHR Press Release: Following the Conviction of Human Rights Activist, CCHR Calls for a Constitutional Review of the Crime of Defamation

Sam Chankea, Adhoc’s provincial coordinator in Kampong Chhnang province (centre), speaks to reporters outside the provincial court earlier this month. (Photo by: Photo Supplied)

Click on the article to zoom in

Hearing today in activist case [against the KDC company]

Sam Chankea, Adhoc’s provincial coordinator in Kampong Chhnang province (centre), speaks to reporters outside the provincial court earlier this month. (Photo by: Photo Supplied)

Suy Sem (L) and his wife Chea Kheng (R)

Tuesday, 25 January 2011
May Titthara
The Phnom Penh Post

Kampong Chhnang provincial court is set to hand down a verdict today in a case against a local activist that rights groups have branded an attack on freedom of expression.

Sam Chankea, the Kampong Chhnang provincial coordinator for local rights group Adhoc, has been accused of defamation and disinformation by the development firm KDC International. KDC is owned by Chea Kheng, the wife of Minister of Industry, Mines and Energy Suy Sem.

The complaint against Sam Chankea stems from a December 2009 interview with Radio Free Asia in which he suggested that the clearance of disputed land in Kampong Tralach district by KDC may have been illegal.

Sam Chankea said yesterday that he was confident that the court did not have the evidence to convict him.

Cambodia: Judicial harassment against Mr. Sam Chankea

Suy Sem, the CPP minister of Mining and Energy, and Chea Kheng, his wife who is accused of harassing Sam Chankea

URGENT APPEAL - THE OBSERVATORY

KHM 001 / 0111 / OBS 002
Judicial Harassment
Cambodia
January 18, 2011

The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), requests your urgent intervention in the following situation in Cambodia.

Description of the situation:

The Observatory has been informed of the judicial harassment faced by Mr. Sam Chankea, Coordinator of the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (ADHOC) in Kampong Chhnang, a human rights defender active in land rights issues.

According to the information received, Mr. Sam Chankea will face trial today, January 18, 2011 before the Kg. Chhnang Provincial Court in Cambodia for allegedly defaming the work of KDC International Company, owned by Lauk Chumteav Chea Kheng, wife of Minister of Mining and Energy.

The complaint against Mr. Sam Chankea follows a radio interview broadcast on December 26, 2009 in which he expressed his opinion over a land case conflict opposing dozens of villagers and the KDC International company in Kampong Chhnang province. In this interview Mr. Sam Chankea stated that “what the company has done is an act of violation since the court has yet to rule on the merits of the case. Therefore the company should suspend the activity and await the ruling on the merits of the case”. He was subsequently quoted in Koh Santepheap newspaper on December 30, 2009.

KDC sues activist in land row

CPP Suy Sem (L) and his wife Chea Kheng (R)

Wednesday, 23 June 2010
May Titthara and Irwin Loy
The Phnom Penh Post

A COMPANY belonging to the wife of a government minister that is involved in a long-simmering land dispute in Kampong Chhnang province has filed a legal complaint accusing a local rights advocate of disinformation – another example, some observers say, of the courts being used to silence criticism in controversial land cases.

Sam Chankea, coordinator for the rights group Adhoc in Kampong Chhnang, said he is the target of a disinformation complaint filed in late May by KDC International Company, which is headed by Chea Kheng, the wife of Minister of Industry, Mines and Energy Suy Sem.

Sam Chankea said the complaint stems from a December 26, 2009, interview with Radio Free Asia, in which he suggested that the clearance of disputed land by the company might be against the law. “The reporter just asked me about my point of view related to the company clearing villagers’ land. I said that if this is a case of clearing land belonging to villagers, it is illegal,” he said.

In the complaint, the company denies clearing disputed land, though Sam Chankea said villagers have insisted otherwise. Sam Chankea said he suspected the complaint was an attempt to intimidate him, because he had recently urged the provincial court to investigate villagers’ claims that they had been victims of a fraudulent land deal.

The company “filed a complaint against me just to threaten me to stop working on this case”, he said. “But I am not worried about this because we are working on human rights.”

KDC representative Thai Hy confirmed that a complaint had been filed against Sam Chankea on May 25, but declined to discuss the allegations at length.

Provincial court prosecutor Penh Vibol also declined to discuss them beyond saying that he had asked police to launch an investigation.

The dispute originally involved 108 families who say they have lived for years on the land in Ta Ches commune’s Lorpeang village. The company says that it bought the land in 1996.

In 2007, the company asserted its ownership of roughly 145 hectares of disputed land, saying it had struck a deal with 105 of the families. Rights groups, however, say 64 holdout families never agreed to sign over their property.

If the disinformation claim proceeds to court, it will mark at least the sixth time KDC International Company has asked the legal system to wade into the dispute, Sam Chankea said.

Since 2002, the company has filed complaints against villagers five times, he said, including a case last year in which the village chief was convicted of forging residents’ thumbprints on a complaint letter detailing claims that villagers had never sold their land to KDC.

‘Criminalisation’ of advocacy

Rights groups say there has been a recent surge in the number of legal cases brought against community groups and advocates involved in land disputes, accusing authorities and well-connected officials of becoming increasingly fond of “intimidation” tactics.

According to Adhoc, at least 235 “human rights defenders” – a term that refers to individual protesters, community representatives or representatives of protesters – faced legal scrutiny in 2009.

Of these, 58 were incarcerated as of January this year, while 88 were on the run.

“Based on these figures, intimidation against human rights defenders in 2009 rose up noticeably, compared to 164 cases in 2008,” Adhoc’s Human Rights Situation report for last year states.

Whereas human rights advocates might once have been quietly accused of “inciting protests”, they are now much more likely to be charged with actual criminal offences, the report states.

“Intimidation is a way to psychologically frighten human rights activists and human rights workers in Cambodia so they will not be able to fulfill their missions....” the report concludes.

“In return, it will force the victims to accept the resolution offered by local authorities who collude with the powerful at the expense of the powerless.”

Yeng Virak, executive director of the Community Legal Education Centre, said there has been an alarming increase in the “criminalisation” of land-dispute cases.

“It means [the courts] are not resolving the problem. They just make the problem worse,” he said.

“If you’re talking about community representatives, it is like they have been victimised twice. Their land is taken away, and at the same time they face criminal charges.”

30 questioned in land dispute, groups say

Wednesday, 03 June 2009
Written by Chrann Chamroeun
The Phnom Penh Post

KAMPONG Chhnang officials questioned 30 residents from Kampong Tralach district's Lor Peang village over a long-running land dispute that has pitted villagers against local authorities, rights groups said Tuesday.

Lor Peang residents claim the village chief and commune councilors forced them to thumbprint documents in February that signalled their agreement to hand 145 hectares of land to KDC, a local developer.

Tot Kim Sroy, provincial coordinator for the Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee (CHRAC), which filed complaints on behalf of the villagers in March, said Tuesday that Kampong Tralach district Deputy Governor Pich Khorn questioned over 30 villagers about their complaints.

"I think it is very good that the authorities have conducted an investigation into their complaints," Tot Kim Sroy said. "I observed that there was really a threat [against the villagers]."

Tot Kim Sroy added that Pich Khorn let the villagers return home and will now report back to provincial Governor Touch Marim.

KDC first laid claim to the land in 2006, prompting villagers to file their initial complaint in the provincial court, which rejected it.

Villagers and rights groups involved in the case say KDC bought part of a 512-hectare plot of land in 2006. KDC claims to have purchased the entire plot, including the disputed 145 hectares, and produced legal titles for it in August 2007.

"At the present time, the 64 families that have handed over farmland are now in a dispute with the company," said resident representative Om Sophy, who added that 14 houses have been destroyed by bulldozers since September 2008.

Sam Chankea, provincial coordinator for the rights group Adhoc, said he "welcomed" the investigations into the dispute, but said the process should have been completed long ago.

"The authorities should have conducted the investigation on this long-simmering dispute from the beginning, so as not to extend it until now," he said.

A Biased Tribunal Violates The Rights of Victims of Land-grabbing in Kompong Chhnang

Phnom Penh, 28 February 2008
Source: SRP

Mr. Thay Hy used forged documents showing the sale of their land by villagers living in the village of Lor Peang, commune of Ta Ches, district of Kompong Tralach, province of Kompong Chhnang, to Company KDC. When the villagers protested that thumbprints appearing on the documents were not theirs, which was certified by an investigation of the Ministry of Interior, villager representatives Mr. Sar Song, aged 55 and Ms.Un Tum, 61 were arrested immediately.

Early January, KDC started to destroy cultures existing on the land and continued to do so, in spite of an order by the provincial governor to stop.

On 26 February 2008, Mr. Sar Song was sentenced by the Kompong Chhnang Court to 10 year-imprisonment for homicide without any evidence.

Today, 28 February 2008, the same Court issued a judgment, sentencing Ms. Un Tum, Mr. Yus To, aged 72 and Mr. Pheng Pho, 70, to 4 month-imprisonment for infringement on the Company's land rights.

As soon as the judgment was read, police immediately tried to arrest Yus To and Pheng Pho who run to the office of Licadho in Kompong Chhnang-city for a shelter. Presently, police forces surround the office of Licadho, waiting for the two to get out of the house to arrest them.

SRP Members of Parliament have protested vigorously by phone with Minister of Justice Ang Vong Vattana who agreed that no one should be arrested right after the sentence is rendered by the Court, as no sentence is definite as long as the accused has not used his right to appeal within 2 months after the judgment is made.

SRP Members of Parliament

For more information, contact 012 73 11 11 or 012 753 877

3 Sentenced in K'pong Chhnang Land Dispute [-Land-grabber get away free, victims sent to jail]

By Chiep Mony, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
28 February 2008

Kampong Chhnang provincial Thursday, and a third in absentia, finding they had court ordered two people to eight months in prisonignored a court order to stay off a tract of private land.

The courts sentenced the two, one man, Sar Song, and one woman, Oun Thum, despite the protests of about 150 people outside the court, who demanded their release.

A third man, Yuos To, was sentenced to eight months in absentia.

The sentences stemmed from a lawsuit by a private company that claimed the three refused to stop living on company land.

Protestors told VOA Khmer by phone Thursday they believed the courts and local officials had been paid off by the local company, known by its initials, KDC, to push them off their land.

Srei Aun, daughter of Oun Thum, called the courts "unjust."

"People who have made no mistake are sentenced to jail, and people who have made mistakes are not punished," she said.

She accused Commune Chief Dy Doeurn of colluding with KDC to oust people from the land.

Dy Doeurn said Thursday he had no relationship with the company. KDC could not be reached for comment.

Sao Pheareak, a rights investigator for Licadho, who monitored the hearing and protest this morning, said the court's decision was unfair.

"As I see it, the company never owned that land," he said.

Provincial Judge Veng Huk dismissed accusations of injustice, telling VOA Khmer by phone Thursday he had made his decision based on the law.

"We already examined the case and saw that those three people grabbed the land of the others, who paid for the official letter of property ownership," he said.

The protestors fired stones from slingshots at military police, injuring one officer, Veng Huk added.

The protestors represented about 108 families who lost their land in a dispute with KDC that has lasted since 2006 and where both sides have accused the other of land theft.

SRP MPs to Accompany Villagers to Recover Their Land

Land-grabbing victims protesting in front of the National Assembly (Photo: SRP)
SRP MPs Sam Rainsy and Eng Chhay Eang talk to the protesters (Photo: SRP)

15 January 2008

MPs TO ACCOMPANY VILLAGERS TO RECOVER THEIR LAND

Today, 77 villagers from Kampong Chhnang province protested in front of the National Assembly and the Ministry of Justice against the confiscation of their lands by a private company.

They represent 108 families who have been living on 184 hectares of lands in Lor Peang and Boeng Kak villages, Ta Ches commune, Kampong Tralach district (about 70 km Northwest of Phnom Penh).

On 9 January 2008, the villagers' lands were grabbed by a company named KDC, owned by Mrs. Chea Kheng, who had the support of armed policemen and commune officials when chasing villagers from their lands. As acknowledged by the Court, KDC Company has used fake thumbprints to claim that villagers sold their lands to Mrs. Chea Kheng.

The villagers will continue their protest in Phnom Penh on 16 January.

On 17 January, they will return to their villages in Kampong Chhnang province and will be accompanied by SRP Members of Parliament including Sam Rainsy. The convoy of villagers and MPs will leave the SRP Headquarters at 8:00 am and will reach its destination at around 9:00 am.

Journalists, diplomats, human rights activists and all interested persons are invited to join the convoy and witness whether the villagers will be able to recover their lands.
SRP Members of Parliament