Cambodian Democracy under pressure

Recently, Comfrel, local NGOs, which is monitoring democracy and election process in Cambodia, released its report by saying that Cambodian democracy is undermined by ruling party such as freedom of expression, ability of debate in the Assembly, without reform of the election system and also pressure on critical civil society groups and members of the media.

At the mean time, the report called on the government to reverse course to ensure the rights of all Cambodians are respected and that systemic factors of democracy are in place.

The report read that “the government has become increasingly intolerant of the exercise of freedom of expression in criticizing corruption, impunity, land grabbing and forced  evictions… although parliamentarians have special impunity from prosecution, they too have found their freedom of expression restricted.”

“We understand that the oppression of free expression, of whatever sort, makes a negative picture for Cambodia,” VOA Khmer quoted Mr. Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights

“Recently the government has used the court to oppress and threaten its critiques. The court is an issue because it is not independent; it cannot protect people fairly before the law. I think the government is taking advantage of a biased judicial system to oppress its critiques,” he added.

“Cambodia’s democratic system currently still suffers from a lot of deficits, especially, the functioning of the National Assembly is worse than in previous government mandates,” Koul Panha, Comfrel director, was quoted by the Cambodia daily as saying.

The Southeast Asian Press Alliance and other concerned groups sent an open letter signed by 12 advocacy groups to Prime Minister Hun Sen July 17, denouncing a “rapidly and palpably deteriorating environment for free expression in Cambodia.”

The open letter also marked concerns that political speech and press freedom have been severely restricted after harsh attacks against parliamentarians, advocates, lawyers and journalists over the past year.