Cambodians fear CPP may stage a coup if it loses in polls<\/p>\n
By Armin Wertz<\/p>\n
PHNOM PENH (DPA): The German embassy in Phnom Penh is reported
\nby Deutsche Welle, the German short-wave radio station, to have
\nwarned that Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party (CPP) may stage a
\ncoup if it loses tomorrow's general election.<\/p>\n
The embassy is said to have expressed this view in a
\nconfidential message relayed to the German foreign office in
\nBonn.<\/p>\n
Staff of the Buddhist Aid Association were somewhat surprised
\nwhen their new chairman increased virtually overnight the number
\nof observers his group was to send to supervise tomorrow's
\ngeneral election from 1,000 to 24,000.<\/p>\n
Their surprise became alarm when, in the days that followed,
\nmore and more soldiers turned up at the organization's head
\noffice to collect their membership cards.<\/p>\n
\"I think most of these observers are from the army,\" said a
\nmember of staff. \"I fear they will create difficulties on
\nelection day.\" When she made this comment she was still unaware
\nthat her new boss was employed by one of the closest associates
\nof Cambodian strongman Hun Sen.<\/p>\n
\"We were not expecting such a fraud,\" said the head of the
\nNational Electoral Commission (NEC), who is now keen to be rid of
\nthese unwanted observers.<\/p>\n
\"Cambodia has the most liberal electoral law in Asia,\"
\nenthuses Peter Schier of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. And, he
\nadds, \"the National Electoral Commission is doing amazingly good
\nwork.\"<\/p>\n
After initial problems during preparations for the election
\nand in the course of the election campaign everything has been
\nrunning astonishingly smoothly for the past two or three months,
\nSchier says.<\/p>\n
The commission certainly has some very hard work to do. It is
\nnot just that supplies of ink were snarled up for days in Phnom
\nPenh's red tape. Voting papers, ballot boxes and electoral
\nregisters had to be shipped to remote areas under the most
\ndifficult conditions.<\/p>\n
The election organizers also faced constant attacks by
\nisolated Khmer Rouge guerrilla units. Two people have been killed
\nso far, and five more injured. The commission now faces an influx
\nof election observers.<\/p>\n
Thirteen Cambodian organizations of various kinds have
\nregistered 60,000 observers, most of whom are totally unqualified
\nand closely linked with the military. \"We hope to be able to
\nclear out at least half of them,\" said an NEC spokeswoman. \"We
\nwill certainly be doing our best to do so.\"<\/p>\n
Yet the commission was forced to admit on Wednesday that it
\nhad already issued 43,000 identity cards for domestic election
\nobservers and that their number could increase to 50,000 by
\nelection day, Sunday.<\/p>\n
They have also registered 648 international observers sent by
\nthe United Nations (UN) and the European Union (EU), all superbly
\nequipped with air-conditioned jeeps and mobile phones.<\/p>\n
According to agency reports the EU has contributed US$11
\nmillion toward the cost of holding the elections, which makes it
\nthe largest foreign donor.<\/p>\n
These observers will be joined by several hundred
\nrepresentatives of diplomatic missions and scores of observers
\nsent by a variety of human rights groups and organizations from
\nEurope and the United States.<\/p>\n
The NEC is only prepared to grant them visitor status. \"They
\nwill be issued with visitor identity cards that include neither
\ntheir names nor pictures,\" says the commission's chairman. \"They
\nwill be allowed to visit polling stations but not to compile
\nofficial reports.\"<\/p>\n
His staff do seem to have done the best they can to ensure
\nfree and fair elections. Yet the chairman is sure that: \"There
\nwill be a lot of complaints. We will be accused of having done
\npoor work. But that is part of the business. The winners will
\ncelebrate and the losers will claim the elections were a fraud.\"<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/cambodians-fear-cpp-may-stage-a-coup-if-it-loses-in-polls-1447893297",
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