Cambodia’s strongman gets a shock at the
polls
SILENCE was the uncharacteristic leitmotif in the recent
election campaign of Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Sen (pictured above). So apparently
confident was he of victory that, over the whole period of the campaign, he did
not once personally deign to canvass support. Then, in the aftermath of the
results announced on the evening of July 28th, he spent several days in hushed
seclusion, perhaps shocked at how well the opposition had fared. He emerged
eventually on July 31st, but no one is sure what he will do next. After 28
years of authoritarian predictability, with Mr Hun Sen himself at the helm, the
only certainty now seems to be that Cambodian politics is entering a phase of
unusual and intriguing flux.
Many had predicted that the opposition would make gains at
this election, but not quite on this scale. According to provisional official
results, the opposition Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP) almost doubled
its share of the 123-seat national assembly, winning 55. Mr Hun Sen’s ruling
Cambodian People’s Party (CPP), by contrast, dropped from 90 to 68 seats, thus
losing the two-thirds majority that had allowed it to fiddle with the
constitution. Minor parties were obliterated by the CNRP steamroller. The CPP
had steadily increased its share of seats in every election since the full
restoration of democracy in 1998. That makes this an extraordinary setback for
them and a stunning result for the CNRP.
Indeed, the leader of the CNRP, Sam Rainsy, claims that his
party won the election, winning 63 seats, a majority. He refuses to accept the
CPP victory, and has asked for an independent committee to be set up to
investigate all the irregularities and their effect on the polls. Full results
will not be known until mid-August. Quite apart from the widespread rigging
reported on polling day itself, the CPP’s monopoly of the media means there has
never been a level electoral playing field. Mr Sam Rainsy himself was not even
allowed back into the country after years of self-exile until a week before
polling (having received a royal pardon for charges that he says were
politically motivated). Even then he was not allowed to stand for a seat.
What went wrong
Why did Mr Hun Sen fare so badly? An authoritarian by
instinct, he has spent years consolidating his grip on power, sometimes
brutally. This time round, though, he faced an unusually united opposition: two
of the bigger groups, the Sam Rainsy party and the Human Rights party, merged
into the CNRP specifically to fight this election. The return of Mr Sam Rainsy,
a former finance minister, also galvanised the opposition, as he revealed
himself to be an unexpectedly charismatic campaigner.
Most important, however, this election saw a generational
shift in attitudes and voting allegiances. Of the 9.5m or so registered voters,
more than half were under 30 years old. They were born after the genocidal
regime of the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s and the civil wars that followed—the primary
reference points for Mr Hun Sen’s political appeal. They were therefore immune
to the usual warnings from the CPP that an opposition victory would spell a
return to civil conflict. This generation is looking forward, not back, and
compares Cambodia with other countries in the region rather than its own dark
past.
The younger generation appreciates the economic gains under
the CPP in recent years, but it wants more. This election was fought on local
issues, which include mounting anger over the granting of land concessions to
Chinese and Vietnamese companies, in hock to cronies of the ruling elite.
There is frustration, too, over a widening wealth gap and
corruption that favours the politically connected. Mounted on their scooters,
armed with social media on their smartphones, the kingdom’s young people voted
for change, and in the process reduced the government-run papers and television
to the role of a state-propaganda machine capable of impressing only its own
supporters. The CPP may have just about hung on in the countryside, but the
urban vote and the youth vote must have gone overwhelmingly to the CNRP.
The choices for Mr Hun Sen, who has said that he wants to be
prime minister for at least another ten years, are stark. He could reform the
CPP, which would include delineating a path for succession and making way for
the next generation of leaders, and reach an accommodation with the opposition.
Or he could dig his heels in and ignore the message of the election. If he does
insist on trying to maintain the status quo, then civil unrest is likely, as is
a drubbing at the polls next time around.
Early indications are, however, that Mr Hun Sen intends to
be pragmatic and conciliatory, as he is rather more often than his harsher
critics allow. In his first, brief post-election remarks he said that he would
accept an independent investigation into allegations of electoral fraud and
that he was prepared to speak to the opposition, as it was important that the
election not divide the country. Such flexibility might yet prolong the career
of a humbled but wily political operator. It would also bode well for a
changing country straining to escape its past. The Economist
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