Election Day in Cambodia

It is July 26th today. Two days from now, only July 28th, Cambodia will have an election. Everywhere we go, motorbike parades are happening, young people crowded into open-air trucks shout, wave, fly flags and drive around, and everywhere you look there are signs posted. The city is alive, electric, although things like traffic are quite affected. Even minor things like my normally included complimentary guesthouse pickup to the bus station have been cancelled, as there are simply too many passionate political demonstrations.

Cambodian People's Party

I find this all very interesting, although it all does make me slightly nervous. I've had a few conversations with locals here about the political situation. One was our tour guide who is educated and used to be a reporter until he had a gun put to his head about a story he was publishing (he quit after that), and the other being a female university student who was watching one of the parades and who excited told me, in rushed but quite good English, what was going on.

A passing bus of National Rescue Party supporters

According to them, the party in power right now is the Cambodian's People's Party, and they are the same party that has been in power since the Khmer Rouge genocide. Cambodia does not have rules about how long a party can keep it's power, so the same party has continued to rule. There are allegations of vote buying in rural villages where people cannot read or write (my new university-going friend told me that it was for only 10,000r -that's only $0.25/vote) and there are many allegations of corruption. In fact, Transparency International, an anticorruption watchdog, ranks Cambodia a lowly 158 out of the 180 countries ranked. Both of the locals I spoke to told me similiar things: the government allows the wealthy or well-connected certain privileges, they make it difficult to suceed in school unless you have the money necessary to buy your marks, they are selling Cambodia's resources at unstainable rate, allowing foreigners to buy land in the National Parks, etc. The opposition party is called the National Rescue Party, and they really seem to have a lot of supporters (in Phnom Penh at least). Many of these political demonstrators are city dwellers, often educated, and young. An ex-pat I was talking to said that some older folk don't want a new party and find the prospect of political change quite scary. This, of course, is a product of living through the genocide. I suppose their view is that even though things aren't perfect at least they are not the Khmer Rouge, and they think that the younger generation just doesn't understand this.

As interesting and currently peaceful as all the demonstrations are, I can't help but feel a little bit glad to be getting out of the capital on election day just based on the sheer amount of demonstrators alone. I'm currently on a bus to Siem Reap, the city where Angkor Wat is. There I will meet two close friends from back home for a few days, as well as some Belgian friends I met in Vietnam (potentially!). I'm really looking forward to seeing all of them, belatedly celebrating my birthday, and exploring some world famous ancient ruins but I think it's probably wise to lay low on the 28th. Siem Reap isn't the capital but it is a large enough city. Regardless, I'm definitely interested in seeing the results!

 

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