Last ride for brave endurance cyclist

Photo by: PHOTO SUPPLIED

Les Stott (left), 60, goes hard, accompanied by Norm Clark, a 55-year-old physical trainer.

Friday, 16 October 2009 15:02 Peter Olszewski

After completing his fourth cross-Cambodia bicycle ride for charity last month, 60-year-old Australian Les Stott is set to throw in his spandex. Following a much-needed rest for his weary limbs, he’ll be back next year encouraging others from the sidelines.

Les has had enough of busting a gut year-on-year, and instead hopes to recruit up to 20 enthusiastic riders to take part in the six-day endurance ride in 2010.

“I’ve done four of these rides and it’s taking its toll; it knocks me about, so I’ve retired,” he told Scene. “I can get as much enjoyment seeing other people challenging themselves as I can by riding myself.”

Last month, Stott was joined by Norm Clark, a 55-year-old physical trainer from Australia. Their odyssey covered 700 kilometres over six days and took in Battambang, Pursat, Kampong Chhnang, Phnom Penh, Kampot and Sihanoukville.

Stott remembers the first day as being the toughest, when they cycled the gruelling 180 kilometres from Siem Reap to Battambang.

“After 100 kilometres my back was killing me. We had been given new, top-class bikes but the configuration was all wrong,” he revealed.

Now he’s out of the saddle, Stott wants to make next year’s ride tougher. In 2008, Stott raised US$33,000, but this time the recesson meant only $5, 000 was raised.

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The ancient Khmer art of Bokator

Photo by: JASON LEAHEY

Twist and shout: Bokator practitioners get to grips with one another

Friday, 16 October 2009 15:02 JASON LEAHEY

ON a blue gym mat in the front yard of the Bokator Mohanokor training school in Siem Reap, a grinning young man sinks down into a full, face-forward split. Next to him, another leaps and snaps a kick into a punching bag dangling from a chain. Both men are seemingly formed from nothing but muscle.

On the front porch, a tour guide named So Samra fills out a registration form for his first class. “I want to improve my health and support the Khmer tradition,” he says.

Behind him, school director Hok Phearom beams at the mention of tradition. Boxkator is the Khmer martial art that pre-dates Angkorian times.

The word “Mohanokor” translates as “empire” and spreading this ancient part of Cambodia’s culture is Hok’s mission.

He gave up a great deal to begin his odyssey: after earning a degree in English in Phnom Penh he had secured a good job, but Bokator was almost lost in the Khmer Rouge years. Its modern revival is powered by San Kim Sean, a practitioner who escaped to the US for 20 years, before returning home to reintroduce the art, and when he asked Hok to start a training school in Siem Reap, Hok left the security of his life behind.

“I love my culture,” he explains, as more young men trickle into the yard, change clothes and limber up. “I worried because some people, they don’t give value to themselves because they are Khmer.” For Hok, Bokator is a matter of individual and cultural self-esteem. Instead of belts, proficiency is measured in kramas.

There are thousands of attacking and defensive positions, many named after animals. There is the lion technique, the crab, the monkey, and so on. Hok and a student demonstrate. At normal speed, the moves are surprisingly graceful and, when taken through to their classroom completion, thoroughly scary. Each demo ends with Hok frozen just before the point of deadly force, hands paused before ripping out a throat.

Bokator is the precursor to modern Khmer boxing, and Hok, like many Khmer men when the subject comes up, speaks with frustration about Thai acquisition of the form after the sacking of Angkor. His distress stems from injured national pride, but also from a belief that what passes for Thai boxing these days is a stunted and abridged version of the original.

As opposed to Thai boxing, Bokator addresses the cerebral as well as the physical. “One parent wouldn’t allow his daughter to learn Bokator,” Hok says, “because he believed that if children learn the martial art they will grow up to be gangsters. But this is not true. I teach students to think before acting.”

Every class ends with meditation, a process that Hok says conflates the spiritual and the physical. Deep breaths that improve blood circulation, for instance, also act to suck in “the power of the wind.”

Hok teaches everyday, charging Khmers $12 for up to 30 hours per month, and $120 to foreigners for the same. He also teaches a free weekly class to youngsters at the Green Gecko NGO.

How might life change if his teachings spread? “Some people are so angry; at my school I teach them to calm down. When fighting, the person who gets angry loses.”

He mimes an angry person, swinging his fists wildly in the air, eyes clenched tight.

“But if he can control his mind,” he says, “then he can win. This is true not only of martial arts, but also in everyday life.”

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Singer laments lack of good live music in town

Photo by: PHOTO SUPPLIED

Australian musician Daniel Sea

Friday, 16 October 2009 15:02 Peter Olszewski

Live music in Siem Reap, like in most resort towns, sucks and is confined mostly to covers of old 60s and 70s tunes, usually perpetrated by over-energetic Filipino bands.

Australian musician Daniel Sea, who performs three evenings a week at Molly Malone’s, laments the lack of decent live music in town.

“There’s not much of a music scene here to be honest, which is a shame because Siem Reap could use a lot more entertainment options.”

While his brief is, as usual, to play cover versions, Sea likes to mix it up to keep things interesting.

“I try to pick songs that people know but maybe they haven’t heard in a long time, and aren’t the obvious choices,” he said.

Sea, 35, grew up around music: his father was an Australian pop star in his youth. He moved to London in 1997 where he formed a rock band, Eight Foot Four.

In 2005, Sea started performing in Asia and first came to Siem Reap as a tourist over three years ago during a break from regular gigs at Choppers bar on Thailand’s Koh Tao.

Since then, he has shared his time between Koh Tao and Siem Reap. Sea also writes songs for other artists, in collaboration with songwriter/producer Niall Flynne.

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Former sex slave wins 2009 Freedom Award

Photo by: AFP

Former Cambodian sex slave Sina Vann arrives for the 2009 Freedom Awards, where she received the Frederick Douglass Award in Los Angeles on Tuesday.

Friday, 16 October 2009 15:03 Jude Mak

SEX slave-turned-activist Sina Vann received the Frederick Douglass Award at the 2009 Freedom Awards in Los Angeles on Tuesday.

Awarded to those who have survived a form of slavery and are actively helping the lives of others, the Frederick Douglass Award provides US$10,000 to help facilitate current work and another $10,000 as a personal reward.

A native of Vietnam, Sina Vann, 25, was kidnapped at the age of 13 and brought to Cambodia to work as a sex slave at a brothel.

Raped by 20 to 30 men daily and beaten if she hesitated to serve customers, Sina Vann was finally freed at the age of 16 after a police raid.

After being rehabilitated at a rescue shelter, she has since been working for the Somaly Mam Foundation as the leader of the Voice for Change initiative, an outreach program for sex slaves.

“We are happy that people not only see people like Sina as a victim but as an activist. This award shows that people understand her [positive] role in society,” said Lin Sylor, a spokesperson for the Somaly Mam Foundation office in Cambodia.

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Broadcast executive charged

Photo by: Heng Chivoan

Sem Sovandeth, deputy director of Southeast Asia Radio and Television stations, leaves Municipal Court on Thursday.

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It is absolute slander, which can destroy [kem sovandeth]
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Friday, 16 October 2009 15:03 Chrann Chamroeun

SEA TV & Radio official accused by partner of embezzling more than $7 million.

A PROMINENT Cambodian broadcasting executive has been charged with breach of trust, accused of embezzling millions in investment money meant for his radio and television network, court officials confirmed Thursday.

Sem Sovandeth, the deputy general director of Southeast Asia TV & Radio (SEA), was held for questioning in Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Thursday after being accused by his business partner of embezzling US$7 million from Japanese financiers – money that was supposed to have been injected into the group’s radio station and TV programming.

“I charged [Sem Sovandeth] with breach of trust,” deputy court prosecutor Plang Sophal said Thursday. “If he is found guilty, he could be sentenced to between one and five years in prison.”

Sem Sovandeth appeared in court Thursday, accompanied by several National Police officers.

Kao Kimhuon, SEA’s general director, said he lodged the complaint against his business partner after discovering what he called “irregularities”.

Money that was supposed to fund staff salaries, building construction and equipment has disappeared, Kao Kimhuon said.

“I have enough credible evidence and witnesses to prove Sem Sovandeth’s irregularities in embezzling more than US$7 million,” said Kao Kimhuon, who is also a secretary of state at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a dean at the University of Cambodia.

“I strongly hope that the court will find justice for us and all the staff … whose salaries have been cheated,” he said.

Kao Kimhuon said he and Sem Sovandeth entered into a business partnership in 2007, negotiating with a Japanese investor to fund a network of television and radio stations.

Southeast Asia Radio, on FM 106, opened in July of that year. Kao Kimhuon said he later transferred the bulk of start-up responsibilities to his partner, including oversight of hiring staff and building a home for the new media entities.

However, an associate of Sem Sovandeth called the allegations baseless.

“Kao Kimhuon’s complaint against his partner on breach of trust … is not true,” said Mam Rasmey, general manager at SEA’s FM 106 radio station. “It is absolute slander, which can destroy his partner.”

Mam Rasmey said the business partners should have sorted out the allegations internally before taking the matter to the courts.

“Sem Sovandeth’s arrest was done very quickly,” he said.

The case’s investigating judge, Chhay Kong, declined to speak about the case in depth when contacted by the Post on Thursday.

“I am terribly sorry that I cannot reveal information about the investigation,” Chhay Kong said. “It might affect the individual’s reputation, and if I dare reveal the information, I will be prosecuted.”

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Liberating 310,000 children

Photo by: SOovan Philong

A child of around 6 years sells birdseed in front of the Royal Palace last month.

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Even among the poorest Cambodian families there is an unparalleled respect for education.
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Friday, 16 October 2009 15:03 Menacherry Paul Joseph

Cambodia might be within a decade of meeting the ILO’s goal of eradicating the worst forms of child labour by the year 2016.

CAN Cambodia end child labour? That’s a question I have often asked myself during the past years. And my answer is: Yes, it can.

I would even set a target year – 2016 – for ending the worst forms of child labour here. The year 2016 is, of course, not one I have chosen at random. It is the year that the ILO has set for ending the worst forms of child labour globally. I believe we can achieve that goal in Cambodia.

In 1999, the ILO Convention No 182 on the Immediate Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour (WFCL) was adopted unanimously by its member states. Cambodia ratified the Convention in 2005 and obliged itself thereby to take immediate measures to eliminate all the WFCL, such as children in slavery (including in trafficking and debt bondage), child prostitution, children in illicit activities (such as drug trafficking) and the use of children in hazardous work that is likely to harm their health, safety or morals.

In June 2008, Prime Minister Hun Sen approved a five-year National Plan of Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour. The plan identified 16 sectors of hazardous child labour for immediate elimination. These sectors include children in domestic labour, quarrying, brick-making, portering, rubber plantations, salt production, fishing, scavenging and begging, etc.

In June this year, the government set 2016 as the target for ending the worst forms of child labour in the country.

The political will seems, then, to be present. Employers and workers organisations, as well as civil society organisations, have also begun to understand and participate in efforts against child labour. But considering the scale of the task, can the WFCL end by 2016? And if so, what resources would be needed to do so?

Some statistics may put matters in perspective. A survey conducted in 2001 showed that 1.5 million children were involved in some form of economic activity in Cambodia. Of these, 750,000 children were working as child labourers, and among them, 250,000 were in the worst forms of child labour.

Recently, the Rome-based Understanding Children’s Work (UCW) Project, a joint effort of the ILO, World Bank and UNICEF, updated this data.

Accounting for population increases since 2001, economic growth, poverty reduction, enhanced accessibility to schools and their improved quality, UCW estimated that presently there are around 310,000 Cambodia children in the WFCL.

To end the worst forms of child labour by 2016, then, involves first removing these 310,000 children from work and putting them in schools or in vocational skills training and retaining them there. At the same time, any fresh entry of children into the workforce must be prevented. The worst forms of child labour can end when these initiatives occur together.

Even for Cambodia, withdrawing and rehabilitating 310,000 children from work over an eight-year period is not an impossible task. In 2007-08, working with the Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training and with the support of the Ministry of Education, the ILO piloted a model for the elimination of the WFCL. In this pilot, the Royal government was able to remove (or prevent) over 18,000 children from hazardous work and rehabilitate them into schools. Removing 310,000 children from hazardous work over the next eight years through an expansion and scaling-up of the work done during the pilot is not an unrealistic target for Cambodia.

But how much would it cost the country to do this?

The UCW project also assessed the additional resources required to eliminate the WFCL in Cambodia by 2016. Based on the cost per child incurred in recent government initiatives for withdrawing and preventing child labour, UCW made this assessment for different economic growth scenarios. They found that even in the worst-case scenario of zero growth over the next eight years, the additional resources required to completely end the WFCL by 2016 would only be around US$90 million. This is roughly $12 million per year. With nearly $1 billion in foreign aid pouring into Cambodia each year, the country can easily afford this modest sum for its vulnerable children. Cambodia, then, can end child labour. But there are a few conditions.

Firstly, there is an immediate need for donors in Cambodia to bring child labour into their donor agenda and fund child labour concerns and programmes within the country.

Unfortunately, few donors, with the exception of the US and its department of labour have paid much attention to funding child labour issues in Cambodia thus far. Child labour does not seem to be on the agenda of most other donors here. Enhancing donor interest on child labour is, therefore, a pressing sine qua non to be addressed.

Secondly, donor support surely does not take away the primary responsibility of the government to itself support and fund child labour programmes.

Child labour is today as much an economic as a child-rights issue. There is a growing realisation within the government that sending children to work instead of to school is not merely of social, moral and ethical concern, but has immense economic implications as well. For each child dropping out from school, the country loses valuable future human resources. Considering the depletion in human capital that occurred during the Khmer Rouge, every bit of future human capital is sorely needed to sustain economic growth. Today, think tanks within the government, such as the Supreme National Economic Council and the Economic, Social and Cultural Observation Unit, have begun to look at the economic implications of child labour. It is expected that this would soon lead to budgetary support for programmes and projects aimed at ending child labour.

Thirdly, there is need for the employers and workers to participate fully in this effort. Civil society also needs to be fully onboard, for child labour cannot end until society appreciates the importance of this task.

Finally, note that even among the poorest Cambodian families, rural or urban, there is an unparalleled respect for education. And note their instinctive and innate impulse to send their sons and daughters to schools. With this native urge for learning, a committed government, increased donor and government funds and a sensitised society, Cambodia can end child labour.

But will it?

My forecast: Yes, it will. And it will end the worst forms of child labour by 2016.

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Menacherry Paul Joseph is the chief technical adviser of the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (ILO IPEC). He has been working in child labour for more than a decade. The views expressed herein are personal to the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ILO.

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Traffic at Sihanoukville Port drops further in September

Photo by: NGUON SOVAN

Containers are loaded at Sihanoukville Autonomous Port, which reported an annualised 20.66 percent drop in traffic last month.

Friday, 16 October 2009 15:01 Nguon Sovan

New deepwater port in Vietnam and economic crisis blamed for 20-percent fall drop in volumes for firm due for IPO in 2010

CARGO handled at Sihanoukville Autonomous Port (PAS) fell by a fifth in September when compared with the same month last year, as coal imports plummeted 63 percent, figures released by the port Thursday show.

The downturn in coal imports, which were described by PAS General Director Lou Kim Chhun as part of the regular ebb and flow in trade in the commodity, magnified falling container volumes on a range of import and export sectors.

“Some months, more coal is imported; some months, less coal is imported, and that dragged handling volumes down further in September,” he said.

The port, which is Cambodia’s largest shipping facility by volume, has now seen throughput fall 11.62 percent over the first nine months of the year to 1.4 million tonnes.

The 20.66 percent year-on-year drop in throughput for September came after a fall of just 6.4 percent in August and slight growth in July.

Revenues dropped 17 percent year on year to $17.92 million to the end of September. Last year, port revenues were $28.8 million, 12 percent up on 2007.

Lou Kim Chhun said imports and exports have both been hit, blaming a mix of the global economic crisis and the launch in June of the Cai Mep deepwater port in southern Vietnam’s Ba Ria Vung Tau province, which has led to a diversion of some traffic up the Mekong to Phnom Penh.

While coal imports have fallen just 7 percent when averaged across the first nine months of the year, imports of containerised cargo have fallen 23.41 percent as domestic demand for goods slumped.

Cargo exports, the bulk of which are ready-made garments, fell 23.66 percent to 225,874 tonnes. The result was broadly in line with the 22.56 percent drop in garment exports over the first eight months of the year reported by the Ministry of Commerce.

“Competition from Cai Mep hasn’t helped, but the port has also been hurt by a fall in garment and textile exports to the US and European countries, along with declining imports of autos and construction materials,” Lou Kim Chhun said.

Steel imports fell 77.88 percent over the first nine months of the year to 7,412 tonnes, figures show, while cement imports fell 23.12 percent to 37,772 tonnes.

Figures released by Phnom Penh Autonomous Port (PPAP) this month show its throughput increased 22.7 percent in September year on year, following gains in both July and August and losses in each of the preceeding six months.

Like Lou Kim Chhun, PPAP Deputy Director Eang Veng Sun put the change down to the impact of the Cai Mep deepwater port.

Before the opening of Cai Mep, exports produced in industrial Phnom Penh had to be carried overland to PAS. It lacks a deepwater port so goods must then be transferred to Singapore, Taiwan or Hong Kong and loaded into a larger container ship to take them to key export markets in the US and Europe. Shipping goods down the Mekong River from Phnom Penh to Cai Mep and then on to those markets is faster.

Port due to list on bourse

PAS is scheduled to be one of three state-owned companies that will list when the planned Cambodia Stock Exchange is launched, which is now expected to take place next year at the earliest.

Mey Vann, director of the Department of Industrial Finance at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, and Ming Bankosal, director general of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Cambodia, were not prepared to comment Thursday on whether the shift in transport volumes from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh would affect the port’s listing plans.

Lou Kim Chhun also refused to comment, saying only that he expected the global economy to recover and freight volumes to rebound. The port also plans to accelerate development of a 70-hectare special economic zone on the adjacent site to attract manufacturers and boost trade volumes, he added.

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Rail network repairs on track

Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN

A bicyclist and passenger ride past cargo wagons Thursday outside of Phnom Penh station. Renovation of Cambodia’s dilapidated rail network should be finished on target, the companies responsible said.

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There were issues related to relocating people who lived along the tracks.
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Friday, 16 October 2009 15:01 JEREMY MULLINS

However, railways official admits that construction of the section linking Cambodia to Vietnam as part of the Trans-Asia Railway is still 'years away'

WORK to repair the country’s decrepit rail network is on track, but construction of the vital Cambodian segment of a planned trans-Asia network is “years away” from beginning, a senior official said Thursday.

Sok Naty, secretary of the Railway Construction Committee, the Royal Railways of Cambodia unit in charge of building the country’s rail network, said a southern line linking Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville was expected to be completed next year.

A northern line from Phnom Penh to Poipet would be operational by 2012 or 2013, he said. However, a China Railway Group feasibility study into a 255-kilometre line from near Phnom Penh to the Vietnamese border had still not been completed. The line is the missing section of the Kunming-Singapore track in a planned Trans-Asia Railway (TAR) linking 28 countries in Asia and Europe.

“We can’t predict today when the Chinese will finish their study, but we hope it will be completed next year so we can determine if the project will be feasible,” Sok Naty said.

He declined to give a start date for construction of the line, but said it was more likely to be “years away” than months. Vietnam completed a feasibility study in September to create a US$438 million line from Ho Chi Minh City to the Cambodian border and plans to begin construction on the four-year project soon, according to press reports.

A Preliminary Technical Study Report seen by the Post in August noted that the proposed line is likely to face a series of cost hurdles that will require additional funding. These include a 1,000-metre bridge crossing of the Mekong River and a 1,500-metre bridge over the Tonle Sap, which would cost a combined $262 million. A government source said that at least $120 million would also have to be spent on smaller bridges along the line.

Repairs of the northern and southern lines are being funded to the tune of $142 million by a group of international contributors, in the form of grants and a long-term low-interest loan. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) contributed $89.9 million, while the remainder came from investments by the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) and the governments of Australia, Cambodia and Malaysia.

Toll Holdings of Australia has an agreement to take over the operation of the two routes when repair work is completed.

Cambodia expects to begin rebuilding 48 kilometres of track in Poipet province in November and complete it early next year as part of the northern line, said ADB Cambodia spokesperson Chantha Kim Thursday. “There were issues related to relocating people who lived along the tracks that were being addressed by the government,” he said. “Mine clearance was also a problem.”

Sok Naty said that when the lines were completed, the first priority would be to start moving goods. “We will concentrate on freight trains, but the first thing we need to do is finish the repairs.”

Restarting passenger services would require working with different contractors, he added.

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