Asia’s longest-serving prime minister Hun Sen is seeking to build a political dynasty, analysts say, with both his son and son-in-law running in Cambodia’s upcoming general elections on July 28. At the same time, at least five other senior members of his ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) also have their sons contesting the election.
The CPP won 90 of 123 National Assembly seats in the last election in 2008. This time, while the party is certain of winning, it is also fearful of surprises and has been running a relentlessly hardball election campaign.
The CPP’s main opponent is the Cambodian National Rescue Party, newly formed by a merger between the two main opposition parties, the Sam Rainsy Party and the Human Rights Party, which have a combined 29 seats in the current assembly.
The younger generation being fielded by the CPP is led by a tight network which will ring-fence Hun Sen, who dominates Cambodia’s often fractious and sometimes vicious political landscape, as he approaches 30 years in power, making him one of the longest-serving leaders in the world.
The premier’s two other sons are senior in the military and intelligence hierarchy and their rise has been described by the local press as “meteoric.”
Hun Sen has rejected opposition allegations that he is aiming to build a dynasty by placing his sons in important positions, saying the CPP made its nominations based on qualifications of the candidates.
“We don’t just make the appointment, they must be qualified,” he said, adding that it is important that young people run for office in order to replace ageing politicians.
“No one starts their work when they are old,” he was quoted as saying by the Radio Free Asia.
The CPP’s policy is to put up younger candidates, CPP Member of Parliament Cheam Yeap told reporters just days ago, defending the move to nominate children of party members. His own son is running for the CPP.
He said: “The children from a number of CPP senior figures are really talented and educated abroad.
“They will be the great future leaders of this country. Every young candidate from our party’s senior figures holds at least a master’s degree from abroad.”
Harish Mehta, a professor of history at Canada’s McMaster University and co-author of the Hun Sen biography “Strongman,” said: ”In the early days when Hun Sen was in power, his focus was on developing a network that would be fiercely loyal to him. It became a huge network in the military and civil administration.
“Now 20 years have gone by... They need young blood, and this brings Hun Sen’s calculation to the next equation. So this is network part two, a dynasty, which will create its own networks of power.”
Deputy Prime Minister Sok An, Interior Minister Sar Kheng, the Senate’s first deputy president Say Chhum, and Supreme Court president Dith Munthy all have their sons running for the CPP in the July 28 polls.
Hun Many, Hun Sen’s youngest son, is contesting a seat in Kampong Speu province. The 30-year-old has been running the CPP’s Voluntary Youth Movement, and is a leader of the Union of Youth Federations of Cambodia, which works in universities across the country. Before that, he spent one year at the National Defence University in Washington, DC.
Hun Manet, the Prime Minister’s oldest son, 35, a graduate of the elite West Point military academy in the United States, is a major-general in the army and deputy chair of the armed forces’ joint chiefs of staff. He is also head of the Ministry of National Defence’s counter-terrorism department, head of an inter-ministerial counter-terrorism taskforce, and deputy commander of his father’s bodyguard unit.
Hun Sen’s second son, Hun Manith, 31, is an army colonel and deputy head of the powerful Military Intelligence Unit. He is also deputy secretary-general of the National Authority for Land Dispute Resolution. Land disputes are among Cambodia’s most contentious issues.
The Prime Minister’s son-in-law Dy Vichea, 32, is the eldest son of the late, extremely powerful police chief Hok Lundy. Dy Vichea is married to Hun Sen’s daughter Mana.
A pilot and chief executive officer of Sokha Helicopters, Dy Vichea has the rank of a major-general, and is also deputy director of central security at the headquarters of the national police. Moreover, his sister is married to Hun Manith.
Hun Sen, still energetic at 61, is leaving nothing to chance. The CPP’s campaigning has been aggressive. While the government has been active in countryside development, and Phnom Penh is booming, there are frictions over land rights, and a changing economy in which Chinese investment is increasingly visible, while commercial pressures are squeezing small and marginal farmers.
The independent but partly USAID-funded National Democratic Institute says on its website: “In recent years, collusion between large, often foreign-owned companies and the political elite has robbed people of their land and their livelihood. The judiciary suffers from political interference and a lack of independence.”
Also, much of the electorate now is a post-civil war generation, increasingly urbanised and with higher expectations of a modern Cambodia.
As an exercise in inducting a younger generation of bright and well-connected elites, schooled abroad unlike most senior CPP figures who had little education and matured through domestic war and turmoil, the July 28 election will be a watershed moment for Cambodia.
By Nirmal Ghosh
Nirmal Ghosh is a senior correspondent with The Straits Times. He is currently Indochina Bureau chief, based in Bangkok. ― Ed.
(Asia News Network)