Basil Fernando

The newly formed Cambodian government has announced of its resolve to cut down the size of the military. This has been a precondition of further aid package for Cambodia considered by donors. As a symbolic gesture to confirm this resolve, Prime Minister Hun Sen resigned from his position as the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. With this move Cambodia may become one of the first countries in Asia to cut down military expenditure significantly. Several ministers have expressed the need for increase in spending on health care and education.

The reduction of military will make the issue of rehabilitation of the ex-military a priority. There are suggestions for land reforms which will ensure land certificates for soldiers who have been living in plots of land and cultivating them. Allowing occupation of small plots of land has been a way of making part of the payment for soldiers’ salaries. The issue of certificates of ownership of such land will reduce the costs of rehabilitation. The ex-military has posed one of the major threats to the law and order in Cambodia. The spread of arms in the country, which is a legacy of the civil war, has made crimes easy. The Cambodian government has already agreed to take steps to disarm the population and to illegalise possession of arms.

Indeed, the Cambodian government may also have to agree to some pleas for democratisation, as new demands for salary increases in the country can only be met with the assistance from foreign donors. In January this year, teachers in Cambodia went on strike for the first time since the Pol Pot’s "revolution"(1975-1979) which killed over a million, or one-seventh, of the population. (In the 1980s the Vietnamese-modelled socialist regime kept tight control over the people and banned any form of protest. However, things have been slowly changing since the U.N.-sponsored elections in 1993.) The demand of the teachers is a rise of salary from US to US0. Although the government has immediately increased US in the teachers’ wages, that has not satisfied the teachers. In fact, the strike has gained momentum and spread throughout the country. The government has acknowledged the genuineness of the grievances but is pleading for an understanding of the government’s own lack of resources. The strike is likely to spread to other sectors including the civil service and the military. In all services, salaries have stagnated at around US to .

What makes reforms inevitable is the end of the civil war with the Khmer Rouge. Pol Pot died in April 1998. (Yet it is suspected that he committed suicide after hearing the news that the remaining clique of the Khmer Rouge had made a deal to arrest him and hand him over for trial by an international tribunal.) Moreover, almost all other leaders of the Khmer Rouge, except for Ta Mok who is known as the butcher due to his record for brutal killings, have made peace with the Phnom Penh government. However, Hun Sen caused an uproar over the terms of peace. When Hun Sen announced that an international tribunal against the Khmer Rouge leaders as unhelpful and invited Khieu Sampan and Nuon Chea to Phnom Penh, he was severely rebuked both at home and abroad. The prime minister soon revoked his position and agreed to a tribunal. Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is expected to reveal the details of the international trial within weeks.